Thursday, July 17, 2014

Jennifer Hasselberger Drives A Truck Through The Lies Of The Clerical Caste Of The Archdiocese Of St Paul and Minneapolis

Archbishop Neinstedt gives the camera his best "I would never tell a lie" expression.


 I just finished reading Jennifer Hasselberger's deposition released by Jeff Anderson and Associates.  The deposition was given for a civil suit against the Archdiocese of Minneapolis/St Paul and involves child sexual abuse by a priest known to have serious sexual issues, but was never the less, appointed pastor of the parish at which the abuse cited in this civil law suit occurred.  Jennifer writes this at the very beginning of her deposition:

1. The statements made herein, unless stated otherwise, are only to be considered as reflective of the situation and circumstances of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis. These statements should not be understood to be representative of the practices of other Catholic dioceses in the United States, of the universal Catholic Church,or of the Holy See.

I'd love to believe the circumstances cited in her deposition were exclusive to the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, but after doing decades of research, I can no longer find it in my Catholic soul to believe the situations and attitudes she describes are unique to this Archdiocese.  They are not the exception to the rule.  They are the actual observed practice, and this in spite of all the recent rules written specifically to look as if these practices are no longer the rule.  The real rule in operation, as Jennifer shows beyond a doubt, is now as it always has been: the welfare of the offending priest before any thought of any justice for a victim.

I also know there really are dioceses where the unwritten rule does not hold sway, but these are the exceptions.  The exception is not the level of duplicity and corruption in the Archdiocese of St Paul and Minneapolis.  The only exception here is that a highly placed Archdiocesan individual refused to play the clerical game, and unsurprisingly she just happened to be a lay woman.  As for religious women and lay men?  They were complicit at least to the extent that information stayed in house that belonged in the hands of police.

I don't know how many times I have written, here and in comments elsewhere, that the corruption and abuses will not stop until Catholics are released from the conditioning that God desires a magical celibate male priest as essential to the sacramental functions in the Church.  The abuses of our clergy, both sexual and financial, will never end as long as all the power is in the hands of the very men who are causing all the problems.  Pope Francis will not solve any of these issues by leaving the current theology of the priesthood as is.  He has done nothing that demonstrates to me he has any desire to change one aspect of this theology. Even if it is eventually decided to let married men in the priesthood, that does not change a thing about the exclusive power held by the priesthood.  

I guess I would be more inclined to have some hope if our priests actually demonstrated some spiritual ability beyond that ascribed to them in Catholic ritual and the catechism, but those priests are so few as to be insignificant.  In the meantime, actions like those described in Jennifer Hasselberger's deposition only serve to demonstrate our current priesthood relies on the power laity give to them and not on any power exclusively theirs that they have taught us God gives them. I wish the average rank and file would think about this the next time they drop cash in the collection basket.

432 comments:

  1. sylvesterpatsteffenJuly 18, 2014 at 12:28 AM

    If I were to identify the single most important cultic practice within the Catholic Church that is responsible for the ingrained abusive habits of the all-male hierarchy, it would be the secret of confession, and confession itself, which has its deep roots in the medieval witch hunt craze. Confession was used to collect "evidence" of female collusion with the devil in evil doing. Secrecy was the hoped for cover-up insituted by hierarchy to hide itself under the cloak of divine blessing. The practice of confession as a precondition to receiving First Holy Communion masks the pretense of hierarchical belief in its self-affirmed divine sanction. It's time for church to stop the tragedy of the Religious Paralysis Syndrome that traumatizes children for life. It just might also end the cultic abuse of women rooted in presumptions of ontological male priority and female inferiority.

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  2. I would also put confession at the top of my list. Both for the reasons you list, and also because nothing else really served to set in concrete the place of the priest in between God and man, heaven and hell.

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  3. That ability to look away really is frightening. I see it as exemplifying the underlying 'my salvation first' motivation inherent in Catholic theology. Like all narcissistic tendencies this motivation is thoroughly grounded in fear. What a sad state of affairs for a Church that owes it's existence to a man who preached love.

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  4. Your contempt of the sacraments is very revealing.

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  5. Maybe, but I don't see much in the New Testament directly attributed to Jesus that indicates he wanted His Apostles to be arbitrators of Grace and judgment between God and man.

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  6. That's ok, ask a priest. Or ask Catholic Answers. Or contact your local parish. The Church and the faithful will gladly help you find your way.

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  7. Invictus 88, I think you must not have frequented colkoch's blog....she has hardly lost her way nor does she need to find the help of Catholic Answers--rather the reverse...you misread her direct address as lacking back up in experience and scholarship

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  8. No, Rachel. He's here a lot. Occasionally makes a point, but mostly pulls this bully troll routine. Calls people stupid or faithless and turns virginal when someone fires back at him. Tiresome, and mostly vapid.

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  9. Oh I am sure they will try. I am also sure they will cite commentaries from Church patriarchs and not much from the New Testament. I am not nearly so lost as you would hope.

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  10. Well, you can't say that unless you've given them the chance to show you first.

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  11. Bullying? I'm been called a paedophile enabler among other things, what have I done in turn to be called a bully?

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  12. Bullying? I'm been called a paedophile enabler among other things, what have I done in turn to be called a bully?

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  13. Perhaps Mr. 88, it are they that feel such an unquestioning loyalty that have lost their way!?

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  14. Is that not what you have been attempting Mr. 88. You and those like you are very not at all convincing and are often very insulting...

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  15. I hope you are not a pedophile or an enabler of those ill people. But you indeed are a bully with the language with which you constantly troll this group. But we have come to understand much about you and they way you project your own faults onto others...

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  16. Lauri, You have my deepest respect.

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  17. It's a bit much to swallow to take allegations of bullying for my use of language, when explicit and vile name calling toward me, and such bitter spiteful slander toward the Church and Her faithful goes completely overlooked. Indeed, is encouraged and receives more 'likes' than any defence of orthodox theology or orthodox practice.

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  18. It is possible.

    But Jesus disagreed.

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  19. BaptizedBabyBoomerJuly 19, 2014 at 2:31 PM

    Invictus, have you read Jennifer Hasselberger's deposition? Aren't you the least bit concerned about the systemic failure of the RCC to address the issues raised within her testimony? Can you possibly detach long enough from your illusions of the priesthood to begin to see the pattern of systemic abuse in the RCC hierarchy? Can you have respect and concern for the victims that is real, valid and will work in a way that prevents abuse? Or will you continue to protect and serve a system that turns its back on resolving problems and enables more abuse? Will your comment back to me be one that does not belittle or bully?

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  20. Come on Mr. 88, you are always are the one that begins the bitter and vile name calling on this blog. Yes, I would agree others should not engage in calling you names back and I have attempted to resist it mostly successfully and rarely unsuccessfully.


    As far as slander toward the church, you seem to take any critique of others that you do not like as slander. What you consider Orthodox practice is different than most people think. Your orthodox ideas have a lot more fundamentalist character and makes you look like a zealot unable to distinguish decency from hardened and even hateful rules. Now please note that I am not calling you either indecent or a zealot, but merely advising you that the way you come across makes you look that way. Since I do not know you, I do not know exactly what you believe, if you are misrepresenting reality or simply misrepresenting the truth. Sometimes it may be a mixture of both.

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  21. Mr. I_88
    The bishops obviously are not willing to enter truth and reconciliation...confessing the corporate sins of the clergy and asking God for forgiveness. They have festering, fetid, foul files dripping stench in their chancery archives, but never ever reveal anything unless forced to. They don't admit to anything without a lawyer at hand.

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  22. Forced confession, at least as it was taught to me, is not valid confession. In that case very few bishops have made a valid confession in the area of sexual abuse. Bishops Cupich of Spokane, and Thomas of Helena are the only two that come to mind as having made valid confessions. Perhaps the rest of the USCCB should engage with Catholic Answers to relearn what is a valid confession.

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  23. Invictus, I really think it's the critique of the Church and it's clergy that you find slanderous. It isn't slanderous when it's based in facts. I wish our leadership was truly faithful to something other than ritual, but the idea of actually living like their for-bearers did and living the Gospel by example, seems beyond them. I guess that's why I find their critique of the consumerist self indulgent culture lacking any credibility.

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  24. In my opinion, the priesthood's "ontological change" is the single, cultic belief most responsible for affecting the abusive habits of clerics, including their utter failure to hold each other accountable for their crimes and sins.

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  25. I think the commenters from the last day confirm what I've said. That is not an excuse for my own many flaws.


    I don't believe I called you an enabler of pedophiles. Pedophiles and their victims are the individuals damaged. The cover up from the hierarchy, the lies protecting an imagined perfection and cementing a privileged power, that's the damage in the church. That's what your style of faith enables and actually promotes. As Christ's people, we should be lifting up those damaged individuals in faith. Instead, we protect the guilty to the point of continuing their crimes, and we punish and silence and excommunicate those who demand reality. We protect the "perfect" church by denying the reality of its imperfections, not believing that God works in reality and demanding a fiction suitable only for a fictional God. So Mary's body lives in heaven, priests are ontologically changed, and two X chromosomes mean you can't lead worship unless you are XXY. And all who disagree are stupid /faithless/evil, at minimum "improperly formed." Sound familiar?


    I'll take the real God in the real church. I'm learning to point out the unreal.

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  26. You dared to have the audacity to disagree with the prevailing views of the progressives!
    The gall!
    There's a certain dichotomy among progressives who decry the authoritative structure of the church. Certainly such authority has been abused, but it isn't, in my opinion, the structure that is the problem, it's those who are abusing their authority.
    On most progressive sites you can easily replace the words "male patriarchy" with "progressive mentality" and illustrate the dichotomy I referred to. The abuse of power remains the same.

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  27. Ok, smart tuchis, let's buy your quite reasonable premise. If it is the "abusers" and not the "structure" causing the problem, what is the next step you or
    i should take?

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  28. On the one hand the answer is simple. On the other it isn't, primarily because we humans only see the simple when the premise aligns with our pre-existing beliefs and opinions. That's not a phenomenon unique to one side or the other, it's human nature. I agree with Colleen; I won't give one red cent to the church until such time as those in charge take substantive measures to fix things. But Colleen and I probably disagree as to what those substantive measures should be. I believe that progressivism is the root of the problems, and that more of it is no solution at all.

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  29. I respect that. And you are right, I disagree with it. But why would you or I be right about such things? We can simply share our experiences and learn to love. If that set of premises leads you to a selfless love...well, I'm trying to give up losing arguments to the Holy Spirit for Lent.


    However, it is my experience that the traditional mindset answers me with the "you must be wrong and therefore evil" approach. It is the traditionalist who twists reality into knots to explain away development as unchanging and always right, read some type of perfection into a human papacy, demand a structure for church (and heaven) which mimics a medieval kingdom. How to explain church positions on slavery, military involvement, usury, Galileo, Crusades, antipopes, and on and on? The answer becomes "I know a guy who explained that in a book" or "You are not a church father -- sit down and shut up." Love? No, follow the rules until your perfection brings holiness. For myself, I don't want to divest the faith. I want the church to fulfill it, just like Christ.


    To revisit the post, Neinstedt is a disaster. If he steps down, he simply rejoins the pews of sinners. But no, he is ontologically changed and above all these things, responsible for all these Minnesotan souls and how could he possibly abandon his post? It is those who argue for the old ways, those who use the church who keep him in power. If you can stand against them from a traditionalist standpoint, I'll be there with you. Standing to the left, of course.

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  30. Yes, exactly. The ontological change fiction wouldn't be necessary if Atonement theology hadn't taken place of primacy and brought with it the idea that Jesus set apart the Apostles to mediate between heaven and hell rather than teach the Good News. Instead of Rabbis Catholicism raised a new Temple Priesthood. Constantine had a whole lot to do with injecting that virus into Jesus' teachings.

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  31. Thanks for the reply Matt. While I understand your viewpoint about traditionalists, I think, respectfully, that it's ... Over-reaching. Perhaps at the heart of the disagreement is the lack of, or perceived lack of, respect for differing viewpoints. We all have reasons upon which we form our opinions, but I believe, again, respectfully, that progressives form opinions about things based upon misinformation, feelings, pseudo-history and pseudo science. I certainly understand that progressives may well believe the same is true of traditionalists, and perhaps it's true for both groups depending upon which issue is currently being debated. But wouldn't a thorough examination of the facts, whether they be scientific or historical, lead to a better if not exactly mutual understanding?

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  32. So we will have a respectful discussion where I get to defend misinformation, pseudo-history, feelings, and pseudo-science? Where I'll finally have to face up to actual facts?


    I don't think you and I define respectful in the same way. Until you think I am worthy of it, there is no discussion, only your pontification.


    One more thing -- "the decline of the church over the last 5 decades" is your take on it. For me, for many others, the decline started in the late seventies. I remember the excitement of the newly minted JPII. Two years later, I said to my wiser friends, "This isn't going very well, is it?" Downhill over our skis since then.

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  33. BaptizedBabyBoomerJuly 21, 2014 at 3:32 PM

    Invictus and Smartukus do not like looking at the facts in Jennifer Hasselberger's deposition. How can anyone have a discussion with Invictus or Smartukus when they both refuse to read the content without any prejudice or beams in their eyes? This deposition is really not about being progressive. It is about the truth of these heinous crimes by the RCC leadership and the sincere and loving way that honest people will address it so it does not happen again.


    Both Smartukus and Invictus want to avoid the problem that is right in front of their own noses and then have a discussion about how liberals don't know anything or have too many feelings.


    Jesus had feelings too. He felt a lot for those who were lepers, the blind, the sick, those who were lame, marginalized, abused. Jesus had what most of our RCC leadership avoids. It avoids caring and having compassion for the victims it has itself created by its own system of cover-ups & outright lies and hypocrisy. It can not even see its own history because it is too busy trying to rewrite it in ways that are slanted to deny the very truth that it should be capable of handling and delivering to the People of God.


    Invictus and Smartukus want to couch things within the framework of a political view that seems to me to be through a pin dot of understanding. There is an entire cosmos both want to ignore the existence of.


    Homework for Invictus and Smartukus is to read and try to practice the St. Francis Prayer and the Sermon on the Mount. Not so easy to practice but sure is easy to preach to others about. Start walking the walk and then we might be able to talk, Invictus and Smartukus.

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  34. Jesus made no demands of unquestioning loyalty the the RCC Leadership. Fact is he was most critical of the leaders of his day.

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  35. "I agree with Colleen; I won't give one red cent to the church until such time as those in charge take substantive measures to fix things."

    Providing for the needs of the Church according to our ability is a moral duty, so do not keep you cents to yourself. Tithe generously, to the FSSP, TFP, LMS, or a good religious order. No?

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  36. The leadership of RCC long lost its authoritative voice when these leaders began to describe themselves as omniscient and tried to get their way pretending their (pseudo) authority from God made them omnipotent. This "authority" has been more than abused, it has been used to further their own delusions leadership. The Bishops mostly are out to protect their own resources rather than shepherd or help average people. They live as if they are princes with tremendous personal and church related wardrobes. They live in little castles and align themselves with the wealthy in the struggle for resources in society. No authority left in these men. NONE AT ALL.


    Unless the clerical structure is improved the Bishops schism away from The People of God will continue to deepen.

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  37. I can't really say that any of them claimed to be omniscient, but the abuses of their authority are too numerous to list. Avarice and political power seem to be two areas of abuse common to most. But the most sinister in my opinion include the faithlessness to God and His Church, and their shadowy efforts to protect pedophiles at any cost while ignoring the innocent victims of their predator "clergy."

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  38. I don't mean to imply that I give nothing to worthy charities, but I won't give a dime to the Novus Ordo establishment nor any of it's connected pseudo-traditionalist groups who are pandering to JP2, Ratzinger, or Francis so that they can be considered "in communion" with that lot.

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  39. We do have some areas of agreement, but the Bishops use of creeping infallibility and authoritarianism causes them to claim a know it all status when it comes to scientific observation that they know so little about.

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  40. Not unquestioning perhaps, but certainly loyalty.

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  41. If you're not in communion with the Pope, Smartuckus, who ARE you in communion with?

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  42. I see. Well, I would be grateful if you could show me A) where I began name-calling here, such as you think explains people saying the appalling things they have? And B) where I have made a statement at odds with the catechism or the writings of the saints or encyclicals of the Church?

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  43. I like our tone much better this way

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  44. I know a good number of priests and seminarians, some very well, and I can assure you that not one of them is guilty of the failings you outline.
    My seminarian friends are full of the Gospel, though I'm suspect that you will have nothing but cynicism at this news of good and faithful priests.

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  45. That's a great question. Please don't consider my response dismissive, as this is actually a very, very important topic to me.
    I would answer your questions with questions if you don't mind the method.
    1.) to what, or to whom are the popes in communion? Can it be said that they, Paul VI through Francis, are in communion with the Catholic Faith? Have they remained true to their oaths to safeguard the Apostolic Faith of Jesus Christ?
    2.) if my right and obligation to attend the Mass, and any priest's right and obligation to celebrate it were guaranteed by papal decree, one which meets all the criteria for an ex cathedra definition (Quo Primum), which also declares any fundamental change by any future pope null and void, wouldn't such a pope who makes changes or defends this changes fall from said communion?
    3.) if the Anglican orders were declared null and void due to defect of form, etc., wouldn't a new rite of ordination with the exact same defects be just as null and void? (Pope Leo XIII)
    4.) if the consecration of bishops is replaced with a simple installment, devoid of the sacramental nature of the previously existent ritual, are the bishops since 1968 really bishops?
    5.) given that if and when a bishop falls into heresy he automatically loses the authority of his office at least until such time as he renounces said heresy, aren't his proclamations, bulls and directives null and void?

    I guess I would say the I am fully in communion with (Eternal) Rome. From my perspective, the modern hierarchy has not been in full communion with the Church for some time.
    Christ did promise us His eternal protection; the gates of Hell will not prevail against His Church. But Jesus never promised it wouldn't be close. In fact, prophesies from Old and New Testaments seem to indicate very difficult times in store.
    The Aryan heresy afflicted the Church for hundreds of years and saw most of the Catholic clergy fall into heresy. 47 popes have been decreed heretical. No pope is impeccable, and papal infallibility is actually very limited in scope. The Church hasn't seen a dogmatic decree in quite some time; nothing from Vatican 2 is actually dogmatic. In fact, by its own standards of personal conscience, how could I be viewed as out of communion?

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  46. Yes, exactly. This is why no other institution has suffered sexual scandals; they have no cultic belief of ontological change. Obviously!

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  47. My "style of faith" promotes abuses? It's not a style, it's just faith. As a start, it's just not bitching about the priesthood, slandering the Church and trying to undermine Her teachings.

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  48. I am very concerned. I just don't let it turn me to hate and disdain.

    The problem isn't the sacramental and celibate priesthood, the problem is abuse. The solution to that is in the first instance better vetting, and in the second better accountability.

    These are secular matters however; introducing heretical doctrines isn't the answer.

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  49. May heaven preserve us from the protestantism of the sedevacantist.

    Worse than the dissident liberals here. At least they don't camouflage themselves as orthodox Catholics.

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  50. To that I can only respond:
    I am what Catholics were for nearly 2000 years. I believe and pray in the same manner as Catholics for nearly 2000 years. I profess my faith in the same manner. I attend the same liturgy. Would you say that Annibale Bugnini was orthodox? Or JP2? Francis? Ratzinger? Montini?
    How can one reconcile these men and their machinations with De Defectibus, Quo Primum and numerous other papal bulls and encyclicals that warned against and anathematized every theological and liturgical change these men have promoted, in direct contravention to their solemn oaths?

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  51. If the church is always correct, a mirror of God here on earth, then I agree with you. I don't see the history of the church upholding that premise. I don't see the words of Christ demanding that.

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  52. Even though I disagree with you, Smarty, it seems that God prizes our effort to know Her more than anything. How else to explain a God who leads you in this manner, Invictus another way, and myself a third divergence? How else to explain saints who are anti-Semites, slaveholders, or allowers of pedophilia? So, assuming both of you are being led to a selfless love which Jesus demands, I salute both of you in prayer.


    Now, how much penance do I have to do for enjoying the two of you arguing?

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  53. Oh, we're not arguing. I take it that Invictus is a fellow Traditional Catholic who, like me of some years ago, was stuck in a quandary. Allegiance to God or man, and where does communion with Rome fall into that equation.
    My family was very close to Father James Wathen, who wrote probably the most thorough critique of the Novus Ordo Missae, The Great Sacrilege. I believe that he struggled with the same issue, but as the years went by and the changes had the predicted results, as the bishops and popes engaged in one heretical act after another, it was far easier to peel back the false "catholic" veneer and recognize these people for what they are; wolves in sheep's clothing.
    Truly, the parallels that exist between this brood of vipers and the Aryans is remarkable. St. Athanasius was excommunicated three times and told that he was extra ecclesiam, but in the end he remained faithful to, and in communion with, as he put it, Eternal Rome, and he has been vindicated.
    I don't know that I believe in the sedevacantist position, but I certainly understand it. I do know that Catholics are not expected to follow the immoral demands of any leader, and we are all commanded to know are Faith. It would be nice if we could have a pope who knew the Faith too.

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  54. You have lied; you do not believe as they did, because your beliefs estrange you where theirs bound them in. You claim to believe, but your heart beats 'Non Serviam!'; your belief is like the early protestants, rightly upset by the abuses and excesses of some in the Church but too vain and proud to love the Church anyway, too vain and proud to serve in the counter-reformation.

    Sunt mala quae libas + ipse venena bibas +

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  55. I believe you have a very incorrect perception. The early Protestants, and Catholics, were rightly upset with abuses, but the Protestants used the excuse of abuses to formulate novel, heretical doctrines, exactly like the Novus Ordo establishment has been doing for some time.

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  56. It was never written that the Church would be made up of perfect people or that all its dealings would be perfect. It was written - however - that it would be the Church, that it alone would teach the full Christian belief, and that we are to be faithful to it.

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  57. I'm a few days late to the party and just finished reading the deposition. I can't imagine what it must be like to be a Catholic (with a conscience) and still be a member of this archdiocese. Neither can I imagine what it must be like to be any of the clerics involved in any way with this situation

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  58. BaptizedBabyBoomerJuly 23, 2014 at 5:40 PM

    Who are you accusing of being hateful and/or disdainful, Invictus?


    The pedophile priests? The abused? The Bishops who continue to harbor pedophiles? I see the current priesthood as being hateful and disdainful, in particular when it comes to women and gay persons. I'll bet you can't relate to that though. Their hatred is becoming more and more evident in the news everyday with gay persons being fired and the Bishops backing US policy against birth control and lying about these issues or just totally blind and ignorant of the truth. Secular problem? They've turned it into a huge secular problem, for sure. Church problem? You bet it is. And it stinks to high heaven!


    Seems to me what you are saying is that male patriarchy is just dandy and all we need to do is wave a magic wand and wish the problem would go away, blame it on sub-standard vetting from ignorance and keep the status quo of misogyny, tell anyone who doesn't agree with you that they are heretics. Right? That's your answer?

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  59. Would Jesus show loyalty to a bishop who empowered sexual abuse of a child. Would he be loyal to a class of men that put themselves above the People of God. Would he be loyal to a group who refuses to make observations in the present and employ their understanding in a new light? So take another look at the life of Jesus. He was not "loyal " to the High Priests who were misbehaving.

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  60. It is not that you are at odds with the catechism, but rather that you see it too concretely rather than as a guide. Most of us have learned by experience that the thoughts, even the encyclicals, of past men demand some critique.


    Even you admitted recently that Coleen once had to take down one of your posts. You call me and others some vile names there.

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  61. Perhaps our definitions of good and faithful are not completely the same!

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  62. I appreciate your logic. I see where the path leads. I would state that all of us are struggling with who gets our allegiance and why. I think you and Invictus (in different ways) get bound up by the rules and led to conclusions that are logical but not loving. I think the rules are subjugated to love by Jesus (remember before when you assigned me "feelings" among the half truths and blather I'd have to defend?). He says so when asked the bottom line. Significantly, he fulfills (catholic word, and a good one) the old law most times but flat breaks it at least twice. I understand healing on the Sabbath, but not washing your hands before eating? Obviously, the rules are not paramount if God breaks God's laws.


    If all our wonderful logic, which I love to use, leads us to an unloving conclusion, I assume I must be wrong because Jesus calls us to love. Invictus calls the church perfect in response, and his selflessness bows to church authority at all costs. You align the recent church with evil, even excluding the popes from your own deep knowledge of the faith. I'm going to call the church humans in search of God and try to love.


    And which of us is correct? Well, obviously none of us. But if it leads you to faith and selfless love, I'll trust it. And if faith demands we predict heaven correctly, I'll see you all in hell when I arrive.

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  63. This archdiocese and it's Archbishop are exhibit number one for the truth that preserving the priesthood and it's privileges transcends any position, be it liberal or conservative, that may be voiced by a given cleric. They may as well put a sign out in front of every seminary: "Jesus believers need not apply."

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  64. Once again the use of the word lied! Are you calling some one a name here?

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  65. We have some areas of agreement and disagreement, let us understand it that way.

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  66. But her exhibit no. 1 still seems to be Wehmeyer. This looks like another failed Anderson brouhaha. If Nienstedt were legally penalized for not defrocking or suspending a priest found guilty of propositioning adults, then that would imply that no man in the USA or anywhere else could be trusted with minors and that anyone running an organization that had anything to do with minors, such as a school, could be sued for negligence. The five women theologians who wrote a rather libelous letter calling for Nienstedt's resignation are just part of the media frenzy, and were rightly not joined by the majority of their colleagues.

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  67. When an Irish bishop was convicted of drunken driving there was a flood of email from his supporters -- not "looking away" but saying "sure we could all be guilty of that!" I do not know if drunken driving is something that comes under the rubric of mandatory reporting or misprision of justice. Our mania about sex means that a man patting a minor's buttocks is regarded as more awesomely awful than a man or woman putting the actual lives of children and others in danger.

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  68. Private auricular confession goes back to the early medieval Irish church (which neither then nor later had any connection with the witch-hunt craze -- a craze that probably began in the time of the Plague in the 14th century -- see Bergman's The Seventh Seal -- but reached its apogee in 16-17th century Europe and America, chiefly in Protestant cultures -- see Arthur Miller, The Crucible). The secret of the confessional means that it would have been impossible to use a penitent's sacramental confessions in a witch trial. Indeed, any priest who breaches that secret faces automatic excommunication.

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  69. But baptism and confirmation produce an even more comprehensive ontological change -- the "indelible sacramental character" --

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  70. "Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven" is directly attributed to Jesus

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  71. It is ridiculous to say that "your style of faith" -- i.e. basic doctrine on the sacraments -- causes child abuse.

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  72. Your sedevacantist use of the child abuse scandal is a mirror of some ultra-progressives use of it.

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  73. I cannot take seriously any poster who is not able to spell NIENstedt and HASELberger.

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  74. I know that you, rdp46, are a bully because I have seen you in action before. You smear invictus as a pedophile, and you do not hesitate to do it to others as well. One wonders why.

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  75. Colkoch, you swallow wildly incorrect potted histories of confessions and witch-hunts -- if you want to appeal to facts you should realize that fact-checking is essential, for starters.

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  76. I don't see invictus as a bitter name-caller -- he is just expostulating about orthodoxy -- and even a liberal theologian like myself cannot avoid seeing that he scores some good points.

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  77. at least he did not call you a pedophile?

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  78. How can I believe you have read the deposition with any care when you cannot spell its author's name?

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  79. Even under this persona you're distasteful and unpleasant, Father O'Leary.

    I see your buddy's 50-year sentence was upheld on appeal. Tsk tsk.

    I apologize to Ms. Haselberger for my spelling error, but I don't give a damn what you think about me, or anything.

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  80. sylvesterpatsteffenJuly 27, 2014 at 3:36 AM

    The calculated abuse of confessions is a fact of history. (Hugh Trevor-Roper, "The Crisis of the Seventeenth Century", pp. 83-177) Psychological and physical torture have been used not just to motivate confessions, (even I would suggest until the present time) but also to "document" St. Thomas Aquinas's theory of demonology; fellow Dominicans were primary agents behind this sorry Church history.
    Required childhood "sacramental" confession as a condition to receiving Holy Communion imposes a sense of guilt and fear on innocent consciences. Extorted confession is no confession, it is a wrongful imposition. The Church used extorted confessions to support belief in Thomas Aquinas's theory of demonology. "The recrudescence of the witch-craze from about 1560 can be documented from innumerable sources. We can trace it geographically, watch it, country by country as the Protestant and Catholic missionaries declare war on the obstinate." (pg. 129) The book is worth a read.

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  81. Huh? So you believe I should contribute my silver to the Judases who betray, on a daily basis, Our Lord, and the innocent children they continue to victimize? What percentage of my donation goes to attorney fees to defend the guilty pedophiles? What percentage goes to provide lavish lifestyles for "bishops" who retire after decades of service that included the whitewashing of crimes and the spiritual abandonment of their dioceses? What percentage is used to facilitate heretical teaching from the pulpit, new and heretical "rites" and "liturgies" that lead the people into heresy and ultimately to Hell? You think God is going to punish me for not contributing to this false church with its false presbyters? Especially when there still are many worthy priests who have not abandoned their vocations, their faith, their oaths to be in communion with Modernism, to whom I do contribute?

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  82. You're quite wrong. But I wonder if you are really willing to discuss it.

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  83. It's not sexual crimes that fill US prisons. It's the war on drugs. The death penalty is a red state phenomenon and even in Texas prisoners have a right of appeal, unlike countries under Sharia law. So even Texas isn't the "most diehard advocate of capital punishment even with torture" on the globe.


    I'm not sure why you brought up 'patting a minor's buttocks' because that particular allegation against Nienstedt isn't part of this blog post...nor did I take it seriously at any time. I will say this, after reading any number of your posts you don't seem to understand the power dynamic involved in clerical sexual abuse. These are only mindless 'acts' to the perpetrator. To the object of the acts they are far from mindless, but then you aren't the first priest I've run across who seems to think the the mystique of the priesthood is as big a joke to everyone else as it is to themselves.

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  84. Joseph you misrepresent the facts, I have NEVER called Mr 88 a pedophile. I did respond to him when he had said that others had called him one stating that I hoped he was neither neither a pedophile or an enabler. You seem, again, a very misguided person with your above description of colkoch. I have had contact with you before and understand your use of conjured up facts, as you have above describing me, in order not to support truth but to support a warped point of view which taints your ideas in a brush of self-centered egotistic nihilism.

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  85. I have rarely taken your posts seriously Father Joseph. If you can not understand that it is the same clerical mindset that hurt children that are now hurting gays, then you are denying truth once again.

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  86. Interesting how your bias reveals itself and how you can equate drunk driving with the sentence of a convicted child pornographer who was also a priest.

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  87. The child abuse scandal is what it is. A symptom of the failure of clericalism and its use of "celibacy" to control this poorly structured organization to which you sir belong.

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  88. Again this scandal is what it is, a symptom, of the clerical system gone wrong under criminal bishops. It will not go away without the resignation of these men and since the church is not about to force these, it just furthers the clerical schism from the many thinking People of God. Your defense of Invictus is very telling dear Father Joseph.

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  89. Once again, Smarticus, I agree with you more than your attacker.

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  90. sylvesterpatsteffenJuly 27, 2014 at 9:06 AM

    Please Joseph, speak to relevant matters, like the (Dominican) conspired myth of demonology still officially advocated from Medieval Catholic Theology.

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  91. I think we all have some common ground when it comes to the abuses. You and I disagree as to what the root problems are, and I have to stand on principle when disagreeing with Invictus and Joseph. Doctrinally I would have much more in common with them, if you'll pardon my use of the obvious.
    We have all compared the modern hierarchy with the Pharisees of Our Lord's time. Perhaps I can best summarize our three different points of view by reiterating what Christ admonished His disciples to do, which was to do as they said, but not what they did since they were hypocrites. I do fully support the discipline of the Church. However, those in charge have long ago abandoned said disciplines and expect their sheep to follow along the new and misguided path. Now so many of those sheep have taken their cue to start creating their own new and misguided paths. I prefer to stay on the right one. I do understand that many don't see it that way, but I think mine is a principled viewpoint supported both doctrinally and historically.

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  92. I deplore the language of personal demons defended by Paul VI and now by Francis -- it is a mythology indeed, though traceable primarily to the New Testament. Its relevance to Haselberger's deposition is nil as far as I can see.

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  93. So you think drunk driving is a harmless offense -- though it takes thousands upon thousands of lives -- why do you not call for mandatory reporting of all priests and others guilty of this life-threatening crime -- and why do you not trawl back through history to dig up past offenses. Of course taking lewd pics of little girls is a horrible crime, but so is drunken driving. If you gloat over a 50 year sentence for the former you should in logic demand an equal sentence for the latter. It is just the sexual yuck-factor you are judging by, not any concern for justice. Also you subscribe to the idea the pedophiles belong to some accursed breed whose crimes deserve the most draconian treatment whereas drunken driving is a common crime we could all have been guilty of, so let's be indulgent and understanding... And that is corrupt.

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  94. The extorted confessions in the witch craze were not sacramental confession -- which in any case the Protestant churches did not have. You are mixing up two completely different things.

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  95. As a woman, mother and grandmother, you bet your clerical butt I think pedophilia rates very high on the demand-for-justice scale. This argument is precisely why I find your presence on any Disqus forum so repugnant. You absolutely do not comprehend the damage child sexual abuse, including the production of child pornography, can and does do its victims, and you offer specious rationalizations for its acceptance, whether you admit it or not. There IS NO logical equation of drunk driving to child sexual abuse, and twisted reasoning does not make it so.

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  96. I certainly do not underestimate the evil of child abuse -- but I think the frenzy about Ratigan and about such minor allegations as that against Nienstedt earlier shows that people base their reactions on a yuck-factor associated with sex and with the accursèd raced of pedophiles, rather than on morality. Thus when I asked why drunken driving should not also be a cause for defrocking clerics, and for mandatory reporting, and for raking up offenses from thirty years ago, the reaction was that there is no comparison -- though this crime kills thousands upon thousands... The reason is that many people know they have been guilty of that crime and also that they have close friends or relatives whom they would not like to be obliged to denounce for that crime

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  97. So reckless life-endangering activities have no legal parity with sexual offenses --- why?


    I think the only logical answers you can give as


    (1) because pedophiles know what they are doing and drunken drivers don't


    (2) because our society "understands" drunken driving, whereas pedophiles are incomprehensible monsters


    (3) because drunken drivers merely kill children whereas perverts who take lewd pics of children damage their souls


    (4) because if I were to prescribe severity, 50 year old sentences, mandatory reporting, and no statute of limitations for drunken drivining I might have to turn myself or my brother or friend over to the cops.

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  98. clericalism and celibacy are certainly part of the problem but to go from there to denying the reality of the Catholic sacraments (including no doubt the Eucharist) is a step too far

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  99. No, coming to a few more understandings about each other. We do not always agree, but I see nothing disrespectful about the way Smarticus has approached this discussion but that is not the same for Mr. 88 or even you Joseph to think we are ganging up. We are only agreeing on what we perceive as truth in the matter of this discussion. I have had many disagreements with Smarticus and Mr. 88 that they have been closer together than I.....

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  100. You've gone off the rails even more than usual. I never said one word about drunk driving -- YOU did -- (except that DD sentences don't equate to child sexual abuse).

    You're having so much fun in this conversation that you certainly don't need my input.

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  101. And I only responded to him when he said that others had called him one. I said, "I hope you are not a pedophile or enabler. Make better use of facts Father joe.

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  102. You have not been around this board very long, sir.

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  103. Where is the feminist propaganda. Perhaps you are having difficulty again in you own discernment of what others are saying.

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  104. If you will check father Joe this post preceded my post in which I answered Mr. 88, " I hope you are neither a pedophile or enabler.

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  105. "I never said one word about drunk driving". You did say that drunk driving cannot be "equated" with child porn -- which in context means you refuse to consider that drunk driving is as serious a crime as child porn -- in fact you think that to equiparate them is risible.

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  106. Even if there were the complete denial that you and Mr. 88 claim, the RCC has denied the sacraments of the Anglicans, Lutherans, Methodists and others. They call the same sacraments valid but illicit for the Orthodox. and Old Catholics. These groups in the near and distant past have had cross ordinations to bolster their claims of validity. So pot call kettle back again,,

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  107. Yes I agree with a great deal here, but I do not agree that man knows THE RIGHT PATH. We constantly must listen to the Holy Spirit for more ideas of how to grow and develop.. So let's try to keep our discussions respectful and there is a good chance we can learn something from each other.

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  108. A pedophile often soul murders a young child putting him or her in a life long Post Traumatic Stress. So these offense are very serious and require that these men be removed from the possbility of repeating them.

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  109. I believe that Christ supplies a genuine ministry and a genuine Eucharist to churches that seek to celebrate the Eucharist as he commanded. I don't think the RCC calls Orthodox sacraments illicit. Nor do I think the Orthodox have ever sought ordination from RC bishops, though Anglicans have. In any case none of that would be a reason for a Catholic to deny the reality of Catholic sacraments.

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  110. If I said to you "I hope you are neither a pedophile or enabler" I think you would be highly offended, and rightly.

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  111. And a drunken driver often murders a young child, in the terminal sense, so this offense is very serious and requires that these men or women be removed from the possibility of repeating it. But I suppose you will say that withdrawing the driving license ensures this whereas only throwing a pedophile in jail for life ensures that he is no longer a danger to children.

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  112. Really? How can you prove it? Jesus left no writings.

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  113. It strikes me how wildly inappropriate it s for the pictured bishop to be wearing liturgical garb for this photo/video. Liturgical garb s only to be worn when presiding to participating in liturgy. Any other use borders on sacralige. Kind of symbolic of how this whole coverup mess is sacraligious.

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  114. sylvesterpatsteffenJuly 27, 2014 at 2:13 PM

    My friend, methinks you split hairs in self-defense. In either case it's about abuse of confidence and the intentional "religious" overreach of females by males, on mythological grounds. "Sacramental" confession roots in a history of institutional malice and ongoing abuse.

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  115. Applying the same hermeneutic to the history of the USA, one could say that slavery and the current justice system are one and the same thing. In either case it's about abuse of power and the intentional overreach of the weak by the strong on ideological grounds. The justice system like slavery roots in a history of institutional malice and ongoing abuse.


    Demonology is a very small part of the theological system of Thomas Aquinas -- contrary to angelology, which plays a big role in his ontology; rather superstitious demonology prevailed where the rational sanity of Thomism was not in control.


    Witch hunting was not a prominent feature of the Inquisition, but seems rather to have flourished where a different and less controlled form of fanaticism prevailed.


    Sacramental confession, which you falsely associated with the torture of "witches", has nothing to do with demonology or witchcraft. It goes back to the second century, and in its private form to the Irish monks of the early middle ages, who were not particularly interested in demonology.

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  116. Has it never dawned on you that people base their reactions on the fact they are parents of children? The most damning statement in Haselberger's entire document was when she stated her clerical superiors had a 'cavalier attitude' towards other people's children. Your comment demonstrates that attitude in spades.

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  117. Bill Lindsay and others take for granted that Nienstedt criminally endangered children. Yet despite the obsessive efforts of Anderson this has still not been shown. He may have been pastorally unwise in handling Wehmeyer, but there is not smoking gun that he knowingly put children in danger. That is what is fuelling the venom of the combox frenzy -- the frustrated urge to find a clear villain.

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  118. Haselberger is writing from an adversarial position like Anderson, and her judgments are not necessarily gospel. Giving a promiscuous gay man who some say had a drink problem pastoral responsibility may have been "cavalier" but it was not necessarily a matter of being cavalier to other people's children, since Wehmeyer was not known to be abusive of minors.


    Any school principals who have to deal with a case of a teacher's sexual molestation of pupils will be accused by angry parents, but not necessarily justly. The urge to jump the gun is understandable and has led Anderson on his decades long wild-goose chase.

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  119. You Mr. 88 are interjecting the idea that you have been called a pedophile enabler, not anyone on this board. Are we supposed to feel sorry for you? Why are you even introducing this topic. No one on this blog has done it. If you are referring to some previous discussion not this one, perhaps you could make that clear. I have no idea weather you are a pedophile or an enabler of child abuse. I certainly hope you are not.

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  120. Wehmeyer is hardly the only priest Haselberger deals with and in point of fact she was right about him. Neither you nor I are privy to the information she had on which she based her concerns about Wehmeyer and other priests.

    Every time I have been privy to information about sexual abuse in my own field I have been furious, and with others have worked to see that the offenders were stripped of their licenses or prosecuted where applicable. There was never any minimizing of the damage this abuse does in a sensitive therapeutic relationship which has with in it a very distinct power differential. And by the way, the hardest sexual abuse victim I ever dealt with was a Roman Catholic priest who had been sexually raped in the seminary and on his first week in his first parish. He wasted the rest of his life trying to come to terms with the cognitive dissonance this engendered in him. He used every denial in the human repertoire to justify these experiences with his wn view of his own priesthood. He was never very successful.

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  121. Sorry father Joseph the RCC does call the priesthood and sacraments of the Orthodox valid but illicit because they do not fall under the RCC canon law.... Yes the Orthodox understand that they certainly do not need ordination through the RCC church. The Anglicans and the Orthodox and the Old Catholics have had cross ordinations probably to deny the validity of the old Papal bulls calling Anglican sacraments not valid. When Rome calls the sacraments of other churches not valid, it seems to me that your description of Colcoch is like the pot calling the kettle black. There is a real question of confession in a young child having any valid meaning at all...

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  122. Invictus, seriously, not everyone who posts here is always playing with a full deck and I suspect sometimes they are playing with a full tumbler of ice and whatever. I've been called all kinds of things and even had my background searched for ammunition to attack me. It's part of the territory and not necessarily a good part. If it bothers you perhaps you should find a blog more in touch with your own sensibilities.

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  123. Does Haselberger say she specifically predicted that Wehmeyer would be found guilty of sexual offenses with minors? Since we are not privy to her information (why not?) and since Wehmeyer remains her exhibit no. 1, the only responsible attitude is to admit that the legal case against Nienstedt is not proven (or not even formulated). When you talk about sexual abuse in your own field you are talking of abuse of adults, not children. But even here, is there any evidence that Wehmeyer was known to have abused adults?


    You say a priest was "sexually raped" both in the seminary and in his first parish appointment. Since the priest was an adult, I presume you mean violent forced penetration (rather than seduction or statutory rape). I suggest that this is a highly untypical event. There is no evidence that Wehmeyer ever raped anyone. Again, your reference to therapists abusing patients does not fit the Wehmeyer case; he hung out in cruising spots.

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  124. Well had I introduced the subject to the board when no one else had said that about Mr. 88 and someone said that to me, I hope you are not a pedophile or an enabler, I would have seen how stupid my comment was. When you insist that I have called him those names, it makes me wonder why you continue to conjure up your own false facts. It is not only true about what you have said about me here but your modus operandi on NCR as well.

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  125. This seems a fragment of a statement. When I reread Colcoch, I do not understand why you are saying it....

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  126. That apparently was not true for those who go on to get Holy Orders and abuse children or the Bishops who allowed them to get away with it. So so me the change that you are referring to, dear Father....

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  127. There is a relevant canon law on this, but I am not a canonist. I am sure that the RCC does not deny the licitness of the sacraments of Eastern Orthodoxy for the Eastern Orthodox themselves, though it may make an issue of Roman Catholics partaking in them; the validity of said sacraments has never been questioned.

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  128. My point is that the "indelible character" is NOT a matter of ontological change in the sense that you imagine; it does not change people into superhumans.

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  129. because she said that nothing of the sort is directly attributed to Jesus

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  130. Yes I mean forced penetration for which he was unwilling but unable to defend himself as he was a small man and quite effeminate.

    I've known following your posts that one has to be very precise in their use of language. I thought sexual rape connoted forced penetration for you, but I guess I was wrong. You can suggest all you want, but his recollection of the amount of this kind of activity was less sanguine than yours.

    Wehmeyer was convicted of sexual assault on two boys which included oral sex. It appears you have some sort of hierarchical system in terms of sexual abuse and what constitutes real sexual abuse from simple butt patting or even seduction. You seem to need to parse things to a very fine level. It works in a logical sense, but not in therapeutic sense. That being the case it is pointless to comment any further. You live in your world and I live in mine and the two do not intersect very much on this issue of sexual abuse.

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  131. I thought it was a non sequitor because that is not the saying attributed to Jesus that I would have used to support auricular Confession. 'Whose sins you shall forgive'....came to my mind.

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  132. The frenzy about Priests like Ratigan should have been taken seriously years ago and we might have prevented some of the horrible abuses that we have had over the centuries. We must grow and develop our ethics and not cling to ancient catholic morals that some times are not even ethical.


    your comparison of drunken driving is not a good one. We have attempted with organizations like MAD to decrease this and with definitions of drunken driving as 80 or 100 mg% bld alcohol. The DMV in California will provide you a chart with weight plotted against numbers of drinks and blood concentration for being drunk. We have on the highways breath tests and the promise by holders of licenses to get a blood test or relinquish their licenses. We have people serving sentences of murder for killing others while drunk on the highways. Not perfect not by a long shot but it has reduced the number of drunk drivers. When I was a kid visiting Texas, my relatives often used to drive wile sipping a glass containing liquor. We now have encouraged people to have a designated driver who pledges not to drink that night.


    The RCC on the other hand as done very little about sexual abuse. They chose to protect priests instead of children. When I hear a priest such as yourself talk about the frenzy to punish these men, thoughts come to my mind of the bishops who aimed at keeping abuse quite. Although the church continues to claim that they have made progress, we continue to see the stone walling of this very serious CRIME. This is very different than what happened with alcohol. Too BAD!!!


    We are now at a stage in RCC with Bishops who have completely lost their authority over anyone who are struggling to maintain there own personal offices and resources.

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  133. I never doubted that you meant sexual rape in the ordinary sense, but as you well know there are many people who speak of priests as child rapists when they mean molesters or seducers of minors. Since I have never in real life heard of a priest being raped in the physical sense I imagined it must be very rare -- we do not have statistics. I never denied that Wehmeyer was guilty of sexual abuse of minors -- merely that Nienstedt was aware of this and permitted it to go on (as Bill Lindsay alleges). This is not just parsing for accuracy, it is making a distinction necessary for just judgment.

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  134. Any school principal who attempts to hide sexual abuse of his or her teachers will and often have been accused justly and are in most cases replaced.


    Many Bishops are not juicy scapegoats, they are in fact juicy enablers of horrors for our children... --- a life time of Post Traumatic Stress. This is what most of these children live. It is in fact Soul Murder....


    Now it is time for parents to cause Bishops and others to fear the consequences of clerical sexual misbehavior.
    Let's stop beating around the Bush Father Joseph, you are far a field in your thinking here.

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  135. Of course sexual offenses should be punished just as drunken driving should. But do you know of anyone sentenced to 50 years for drunken driving?


    And do you not think the bishops have been taking the same steps against sexual abuse as society has been taking against drunken driving?


    .

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  136. One last comment and then I'll go back to playing Game of Thrones. The priest I have written about went to seminary in the Archdiocese of Minneapolis. I heard all about St John's Abbey and what went on in the seminary and the monastery. I thought some of it was exaggerated until I read Richard Sipe's work and his experiences in the same abbey and with the same seminary program. This Archdiocese is a cess pool and has been for a very long time. Nienstedt has done squat to address this fact and his gay marriage crusade was a freaking joke given what he had to know about it's history. Did Haselberger's whistle blowing surprise me? No, what surprised me is how long it took her to get past her Catholic indoctrination and call a spade a spade.

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  137. No it seems rather to be parsing for making judgements without much fact. Sexual abuse of minors is a crime just as is rape. Many seminarians have indeed been raped by priests. Read what happened in the case of the Marciel Maciel and many others. These seminarians even wrote letters to the hastily canonized John Paul the great enabler of many things that are going to be further documented as the years pass. In my own seminary, I new of 2 rapes of seminarians in one year. There was also a person that was dismissed from the seminary for punching out one of the rapist priests. This simply has been happening for eons.

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  138. Bishops "are in fact juicy enablers of horrors for our children" is a sweeping statement, and is being applied to Nienstedt without evidence.

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  139. How can I believe that you have any credibility with such a comment, dear father.....

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  140. sylvesterpatsteffenJuly 27, 2014 at 7:03 PM

    Demonology is still big stuff in Church culture. People are steeped in it. Its detail owes to and originates from the cruel abuse of women whose extracted confessions specified (in demonologist minds) the various kinds of demonic manifestation, "useful" yet in the "rite" of exorcism. The Church sure doesn't buy into the notion that demonology is myth-based. Mytheological demonology has fervent hierarchical adherents to this day.

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  141. Marcial Maciel was not typical of how priests behave -- I have never met anyone remotely resembling him in the clerical world. I spent 10 years in seminaries and I never heard of any case of rape or allegation of rape. "This simply has been happening for eons" paints a sweeping and I think very misleading picture. In all the reports on sexual abuse in Ireland I don*t recall any mention of a seminarian being raped.

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  142. Please see my previous posts! At least society has tried to stop this from happening and charges people with murder for killing people while drunk. The RCC has put most of its efforts into covering up the sexual abuse crimes and very little to see that they do not continue.

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  143. ?????? perhaps your denial has gone so far as to not recognize the smoking gun already pointed out......

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  144. I resent the accusations that I called him one. You Father O'leary are using deceitful accusations not based in any fact.

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  145. The monastery is a Benedictine institution -- I do not think it has any connection with the diocese or the diocesan seminary. Even if both places were gay hothouses, this is a different question from handling child abuse. It could be that Nienstedt's animus against gay sex was part of an effort to change the gay culture that you claim was prevalent in his diocese (in line with the Vatican Instuction attempting to ban gays from seminaries), and again this has little to do with the specific allegation that he endangered children. Even if all the priests in his diocese and in the benedictine monastery were involved in frenetic sex all the time, there would be nothing against the civil law in that.

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  146. sylvesterpatsteffenJuly 27, 2014 at 7:15 PM

    Pray tell, what is "indelible character"?

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  147. sylvesterpatsteffenJuly 27, 2014 at 7:18 PM

    The historical contempt of Church hierarchy toward women is more revealing - and the revelation is inhumane and irrational. And it goes on.

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  148. Again parsing and twisting, there have been occasions of Eastern Orthodox and Anglican cross ordinations of priests and bishops as there have been with Old Catholics. Now for one that loves to engage in parsing words and corrects spelling of others. Illicit means it is not legal according to canon law. It does not mean that the sacrament is not valid. I have not heard of one that does not believe in the sacraments at all on this board. I have heard some sever criticism of confession of children not being at all sacramental. I have pointed out that the Catholic church has at times refused to see the validity of the sacraments in other churches such as the Anglicans, Methodists and Lutherans. Again, dear Father, you are the pot calling the kettle black...

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  149. No I do not see a smoking gun. Could you indicate what you are referring to?

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  150. Well it was Mr. 88 who may have been seeking some sort of sympathy from others who conjured up the idea that he had been called these names. I responded in kind that I hope he was not one, and I still have that hope. I never accused him of being one, it was he that started the topic of being accused when he was not. It was he who has been very indiscrete with his comments about others and if you or he do not like the way I addressed his thoughts, that is your problem(s)...

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  151. sylvesterpatsteffenJuly 27, 2014 at 7:58 PM

    Please enlighten me. So, you're confident google got it right?

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  152. More sweeping denial. Go back to the reports in the fifties of Father Fitzgerald. This was about children that were seminarians and the abuse that they received from priests. How about the neutering of children for choirs in the middle ages. The problem is that the church has never supported healthy psycho-sexual development in the clergy. These men did not know how to support it in the laity. Still Don't!!!!

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  153. You obviously are not (thank goodness) a parent of a child - flesh of your flesh, bone of your bone. The most cherished gift any human being is called to steward in this world. The reality of bearing and raising children is an awsome life changing experience, so much so that people literally physically and psychically change from taking on the task. Most parents love their children to an extent far larger than your "calm consideration". The first reaction most parents would have to such a violation of their child is to seek out the perpetrator and mutilate them outright!


    When presented with such glaring obfuscation and cover-up of these violations by not 1 but 4 bishops in Mpls/St. Paul, which allowed the violations to continue again and again and again even after the Charter was set in place; it's a wonder that we don't see crowds with pitchforks and torches breaking through the chancery doors!!! Ax to grind indeed, there are faithful Catholics who's children were violated and who's lives were placed in utter turmoil by these very "serene" and "reasoned" clerics.
    The clerical order of this church is a mess and if they can't or won't get to the bottom of what is driving their utter lack of vision to see the real damage their actions have done and actually ask for help from the faithful who have children and can see, the faithful are more than happy to shake the dust off their feet and leave the "calm considerate" balm of Holy Mother Church for the safety of their children. Believe me when I tell you this is happening in spades...

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  154. Oh for heaven's sake - go back to trying to figure out how many angels can dance on the head of a pin will yah?

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  155. EXCEPT, such a culture, with all it's blatant hypocrisy is a seriously corrupted witness to all things Catholic. I better stop before I start sounding even more like Bill Donohue.

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  156. Fr Joe is only repeating the Catholic mindset which takes sex out of the context of relationship with another human being. He insists on making his judgements act based only, as if the relationship between a priest and a Catholic child had no bearing on the huge amount of damage done to the child. Until Catholic morality is based on relationships as opposed to acts, this kind of thinking will undermine any real conceptualization of what spirituality is all about. It's as if Jesus never ever said that business about millstones and children. Jesus' teachings about our actions are in context of how we RELATE to others. Fr Joe seems to be utterly missing that point. I think it was this failure to compute that finally drove Jennifer Haselberger to blowing the whistle.

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  157. I don't deny the Eucharist. I deny it takes a special class of ordained celibate men to bring forth that reality.

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  158. CAELewis, You always have intelligent, caring and thought provoking comments.

    I look forward to what you have to say!!
    It takes someone that is a coward in a collar that spreads his gospel of minimization and enabling of human tragedy to miss your important thoughts and point out a spelling error.
    It seems to me that you might be guilty of minimizing, when you referred to Father Joe "Windbag" O'Leary as being distasteful and unpleasant for he is much more revolting than your kind description implies.




    I hope that this gave you a chuckle.

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  159. O'Leary sickens me. If Rattigan would have touched and took pictures of my daughter he would be wishing for a fifty year sentence.

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  160. CAELewis, please see my reply to O'Leary the cleric that describes the sexual assault of a child as a man "patting a minors bottom".

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  161. Well you did not complete my quote, "MANY (capitols used for emphasis) Bishops............" And Nienstedt is a very suspicious bishops that just had the carpet pulled out from under his feet by Jennifer Hasselberger and a letter from tenured Theology professors at St. Thomas College in Minneapolis. This morning both the New York Times and the Minneapolis Star Tribune are on his case and NPR has put out a documentary about his and his predecessors mismanagement. So Bishops clean up your own houses and some of you including Nienstedt and several others in the US should resign or cause more disrespect of clerics and the RCC in the US. The People of God are at work to uncover this secretive bunch of authoritarians.....

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  162. You are up to your old tricks. Joe you are a typical coward in a collar.

    You minimize the sexual abuse of a child to such a ridiculous level "patting a minors bottom"
    Well Joe, My rapist in a collar had me convinced as a little boy that he could keep my dad out hell for killing many people in the war. He was sodomizing me after I served mass almost every Sunday. I was also scared that my father would find out and he would kill the priest and end up in hell anyway. I walked home after serving mass and would always take an alley so that I could crawl in a dumpster to get rid of by bloody and semen filled underwear so that my parents would not find out. I cried buckets of tears in those filthy dumpsters.
    Be a real priest like Tom Doyle and get a clue and stop Minimizing the sexual assault of children. It was soul murder as well as physical and emotional torture, the physical and mental pain is indescribable. The way that you and the church treats victims is just as despicable and painful.

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  163. I already wrote you twice about your poor comparison to drunken driving. The RCC is way behind in their attempts to curb pedophiles than society is in its attempt to curb drunken driving. According to Father Thomas Doyle. this type of sexual abuse by a respected person is equivalent to soul murder. Those of us in the medical field know that these kids will almost certainly suffer life long symptoms of PTSD and alexithymia. Yet you persist in making false comparisons and minimizing the problem. Why all the denial on your part, dear Father Joseph?

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  164. You continued your comparison with this bishop and drunk driving in your conversation with me. Your assertions seem disingenuous to say the least.....

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  165. I know an opthamologist in Brooklyn that works with the blind and selling bridges..... Perhaps you might visit him one day.

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  166. You are trying to brew up a legal case, but as Anderson found after decades of dancing on pins, the case just does not seem to be there.

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  167. Nienstedt would probably agree with you on that!

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  168. So what is different about "the inside character" of a priest when compared to married or single laity????

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  169. "seek out the perpetrator and mutilate them outright" -- that is exactly the sort of lynchmob hysteria at work here. It could be that Nienstedt is just being scapegoated as a vent for it. The law is there to provide clarity and justice. The refusal of the calm consideration required to establish justice in every case is one of the evils of American society.

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  170. Just keep reading. It involves the Faculty members at St. Thomas College, the New York Times the local Minneapolis paper and an NPR special report. Just keep looking dear father....

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  171. ?????????? Where is that comment coming from dear Father.

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  172. I am not discussing such lofty matters as spirituality and love, just querying those who think Nienstedt should be in jail. Maybe he is not a model of spirituality and relationships, and maybe I am not, and maybe you are not. But justice is a much more elementary matter than that.

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  173. He is such a poor model of a leader that he should resign for the good of the RCC and for his own good....

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  174. so the "smoking gun" means the "media frenzy" -- lynchmob thinking again

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  175. I do not minimize the horror of real sexual crimes against children. I just think it is silly to count "patting a minor's bottom" among such serious crimes as many of the frenzy mongers are happy to do..

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  176. Colkoch and CAELewis and several others have claimed to study Hasenberger's affidavit, yet consistently misspell both her and Nienstedt's name. That is a significant sign of their lack of concern for accuracy, which is further shown in their substitution of abuse for rational argument.

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  177. So you have murder in your heart.

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  178. Well you can call a man patting a minor's bottom the sexual assault of a child if you want (and many did when Nienstedt was accused of it) but then more serious forms of abuse are trivialized.

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  179. Without a second thought. If someone did to my daughter what was done to me. They would be explaining themselves directly to GOD shortly after I became aware of the horrid deed.

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  180. The church has made huge efforts to stop child abuse from happening. If there was a SNAP for victims of drunken driving you should welcome it.

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  181. "character" is used in the sense of something like a stamp or seal not of "inside character" --

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  182. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacramental_character

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  183. Yes, but that is what the law, and also the Gospel, calls murder.

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  184. Happy to hear that. I was afraid you would dismiss the eucharist too as "magic"

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  185. only five faculty members, a small minority

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  186. Your attempt to minimize and hide the horrible misbehavior of those that would empower sexual assault on children and adults. This is why we can not take you at all seriously. You try to parse your language in such a way as to make your opinion seem valid, but is this not what the RCC bishops have done? To bad many have not resigned because they continue to cause a serious mess. One so serious that like you, they will not be taken seriously in much of what they say.....

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  187. You said you had a smoking gun to prove that Nienstedt criminally endangered children -- the court has not yet decided whether such a case can be made -- you seem confident that Nienstedt "would empower sexual assault on children" -- that does not seem obvious to me at all

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  188. correcting spelling is not bullying -- good god, you sound like a nightmare student who would denounce any correction from his or her prof as "academic abuse"

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  189. the notion of the sacramental character may be old-fashioned and somewhat problematic (it does not figure prominently in post Vatican II theology of the priesthood) but I would not dismiss it as "magic"

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  190. Again, you project into others a lot that is not there. You do that constantly while twisting what they say. Then you attempt to argue with them as if they said what you twisted.....

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  191. This piece in Wikipedia only confirms that the clergy see their powers as magic. Seems that these men are defining themselves as omnipotent beings who can bestow magical indelible change. Even if it were true, then you would have to ask yourself what happened to these indelible marks in the child abusers and the Bishops who saw or see fit to enable these crimes.....

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  192. Unless you can show the stamp it appears to be a manipulation that priests have an especially large one that separates them from the rest of the People of God. That is a magical declaration by old thinkers that should be updated in the light of what men currently know. Priests are no different than others. It is interesting to me that the church never has mentioned such a magical seal about marriage. Bishops have used this idea as a manipulation tool way too long. Perhaps they even took it seriously and did not report criminal abusers because of this magic stamp or seal.....

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  193. Joe, your credibility about the spelling thing would be higher if you hadn't just spelled Haselberger's last name as Hasenberger. We all make mistakes huh Joe?

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  194. In the 50's there were many minor seminaries for children and many child seminarians. Many of these boys went on to be ordained. Father Fitzgerald address priests as venom that attacked these young seminarians. No, sir, I am not changing the topic and I too have worked with a priest that was raped as an adult in a seminary. I know that between priests there is more consensual sex than there is rape. Sipe has certainly pointed it out, but there has been for eons those in the RCC that have taken advantage of male seminarians, other adults (male and female) in their parishes and children. Let's not parse words here. No one is changing the subject on you, just pointing out the enormity of the problem in the clerical institution and why bishops have lost so much creditability amongst the public by attempting to keep it quiet.

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