In the Desert Wilderness of Prison, a Priest Meets the Devil

After forty-four years of priesthood, thirty-two of them in the darkness of unjust imprisonment, my faith has been sorely tested but I remain a priest in full.

June 10, 2026 by Father Gordon MacRae

Note from Father MacRae: My friend, Pornchai Moontri and I are indebted to Rebecca Virelles for her fine reflection on my life as a priest and prisoner published here last week. It caused me to reconsider this post about a demonic encounter first written in 2023. So much of the aftermath of that story has evolved, and new information has caused me to want to delve into it again. As Rebecca has described in last week’s post, Pornchai Maximilian and I have been on a road less traveled, and now we are far along that road. Your prayers, support and openness to the truth we tell have been the greatest Gospel witness for us.

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In 1945, at the end of World War II and eight years before I was born, the film, Going My Way swept the Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, and Best Musical Score. The film about a Catholic priest and his efforts to save a dying urban parish was a huge box-office hit in 1945. Bing Crosby won the Best Actor Oscar for his role as Father Chuck O’Malley, a young priest with a golden voice sent to revitalize a quickly fading parish. Barry Fitzgerald won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in the role of the elderly pastor, Father Fitzgibbon. It was a different Church, a different time, and a very different world.

Bing Crosby’s character, Father Chuck O’Malley, saved the day and the parish when he organized a neighborhood gang of street kids into a “bit rough around the edges” choir. Father O’Malley then composed a hit song and taught them to sing it. “Swinging on a Star” topped the charts and won the Oscar for Best Song. The young men saved the church while Father O’Malley saved them. Going My Way also swept the Golden Globe and New York Film Critic Awards.

Now jump ahead 60 years. In 2005 another film about Catholic priests won the Academy Award for Best Picture and won The Boston Globe an ill-conceived Pulitzer for “Public Service.” That scornful film was Spotlight, a one-sided, jaded, cynical effort to smear the Catholic Church and priesthood with a broad brush as “slayers of the soul.” The critics and media were delighted, but one brave journalist, JoAnn Wypijewski, performed a much-needed autopsy on it. Though I never figured into the film, I had a strong presence in its autopsy in “Oscar Hangover Special: Why “Spotlight” Is a Terrible Film.”

The 60-year period in between Going My Way and Spotlight saw perhaps the greatest cultural shift the Western World had ever known. Our news media turned left, and the left became its master. Then the Second Vatican Council radically altered the world’s view of the Church. Then Roe v Wade happened and the not-yet-woke Church came down on the side of life. All the attacks hence were really about Roe v Wade. Then the “woke” were born.

On June 5, 1982, as this rapid descent in the world’s view of the Church and priesthood was well into its decline, I was the sole candidate for priesthood ordination in the Diocese of Manchester, New Hampshire. How I got to that point is a longer story that I have never been able to fully comprehend. In hindsight, it has elements of the demonic, and I will get back to that.

There is for now a “rest of the story” fully known only to one other person, and that person has since passed from this life. In 1977 and 1978, I spent long hours with this story in the company of Father Benedict Groeschel. Before he became a founder of the Friars of the Renewal (CFR), we were members of the same Capuchin Franciscan Province based in New York. Father Groeschel was aware of all that had happened, and he listened intently to its impact on me. In 1978, he and I together discerned a different path that I had to take. I will get back to that too, but first back up a few years.

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Priesthood in the Coming Cancel Culture

At the age of twenty-one, four years after my high school graduation, I entered the novitiate of the Capuchin Order in 1974. I felt immediately that I was on the right path in life. I did not have much of a family life growing up, and the Capuchin emphasis on life in community drew me in. I also strongly believed that I had a vocation to religious life. One of my friends in the Order grew up in an orphanage, and, like him, I treasured the accountability and support of a religious community that many others took for granted.

I was also a very good student. I had carried a double major in psychology and philosophy on a scholarship at Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire. I thought I had a perfect balance of intellectual growth, spiritual life, and physical work. When I was not studying, I chopped firewood for long hours each day. A lot of stress was vented, and some wounds long neglected began to heal.

I loved my Capuchin community and I developed many close friendships among its members. Two of those friendships were with classmates from the Western Pacific Island of Guam. We were the same age and often studied together. I learned a great deal about the home and culture they left behind on the far side of the world. At that time, Guam was a mission territory for the Order and several members of our Capuchin province were assigned there. I began to discern that Guam might be where my future lay, so I began to study its culture and native language, Chamorro.

Then tragedy struck. It blindsighted me and forever altered my path. Being far from home for long periods of time had an effect on my friends. One of them began to exhibit signs of extreme stress manifested in paranoia. One night he knocked on my friary door awakening me at 3:00 AM. He was very upset and shaken, and he asked me to come to his room. I went with him and found there a kitchen knife impaled in his mattress with a typed note threatening his life.

My friend was very shaken by this, and I remained with him until dawn and then took him and the evidence to the room of our religious superior. My friend was questioned at length while I remained outside the room. Similar incidents occurred on two more occasions over the next few weeks. I told the local superior of my growing concern that my friend was under extreme stress, and I believed that he had been doing this to himself and needed immediate help.

On the next day, I was again summoned to the office of the superior. I was summoned alone. Accompanied by two other senior members of the Order, he accused me of plotting to murder my friend. I could not fathom what was behind this, but I insisted that my friend was under extreme stress and had been doing this to himself. I insisted that he needed immediate help. Then the superior revealed that he had in his hands the ribbon from my typewriter where the threatening notes had clearly been typed — but not by me.

Under obedience, for the next two weeks I was confined to my quarters and forbidden from speaking with anyone else. I was going through final exams for the semester in that same week. I excelled in them, but to this day I do not know how. This all happened in the spring of 1977.

At the end of those two weeks, the local superior summoned me again. One priest on the formation staff had been skeptical of the story and its outcome, so he spent a few nights in the friary library from where he could observe my friend’s room from a distance. On one of those nights he saw him come out of his room, return with a knife, and then plunge it with another note into his own mattress. My friend was then taken away.

The superior who later summoned me again told me only that his investigation was complete, and that he concluded that I had nothing to do with these events except that I was a friend of the other Capuchin. “You should just forget about all this and keep doing what you’ve been doing,” he said. And it was over.

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Still in the Eye of the Storm

But it wasn’t really over. Because I was barred from discussing these incidents, no one else in the Province was told the truth of this story or its outcome. All anyone knew was that my friend disappeared in the night, and I had been a suspect. I was also very concerned for my friend. I had not been able to learn any of what had happened to him, or why it happened, or where he went. To protect him from any further exposure, I told only one person, about this story and what I knew to date. That person was Father Benedict Groeschel, a psychologist and respected member of the Province. Among all the feelings of betrayal, injustice, and anger at the rush to judgment, I was first and foremost heartbroken.

When I learned that my friend had typed these notes on my typewriter while I was away and then carried out these assaults upon himself just as I had feared, I was furious — not with him but with those in authority in the Order who would not listen because their minds were already made up. I never saw or heard from my friend again, and I never learned what was behind his pleading cry for help made through me. I also never learned what became of him.

I was 24 years old then. I am nearly 74 now, and I still carry this after all these years. I also had no idea then that such devastating false witness would be repeated in my life 15 years later as a diocesan priest.

In 1978, one year after the events described above, the Province gave a strong recommendation, under the direction of Father Groeschel, in support of my decision to transfer to studies toward diocesan priesthood. In the ensuing years, I completed a Master of Divinity degree and Pontifical degree in Sacred Theology at Saint Mary’s Seminary and University in Baltimore. As written above, I was ordained for the Diocese of Manchester on June 5, 1982. There was one other candidate for ordination that year, but he dropped out just weeks before being ordained.

The story about my friend from Guam stayed buried for the next 42 years. Then, in 2019, a previously unknown factor in the story was revealed to me. A Capuchin priest from my former Province came to this prison for Mass and asked to speak with me after. He told me that he remembered this incident and hoped that I did not. I told him that my life was radically altered as a result of it. He said that he felt partially responsible. He had been pursuing a sabbatical study in Sacred Scripture at Harvard Divinity School in 1977, the same year as the events above. My uncle, a Jesuit priest and renowned Scripture scholar was a faculty member at Harvard at that time, and they had a chance meeting.

I mentioned earlier that there were hints of the demonic in this story. It was in the form of events that were set up like dominoes intended to fall in just the right way and at just the right time to steer this story.

My uncle approached the Capuchin priest at Harvard and asked him if he and I were in the same province. The Capuchin said that we were, and my uncle inquired about how I was. The events written above had all taken place in just the two previous weeks in 1977, but my uncle knew nothing of what had transpired in those weeks. The Capuchin told my uncle about these events, but this was before the discovery that I was not the cause of them. Upon hearing this partial story, my uncle shared with the Capuchin that I had a difficult life growing up in a home and family destroyed by alcoholism. My uncle expressed to the Capuchin that he was glad to know that I had the support of a religious community.

Forty-two years later, the Capuchin priest told me that he shared my uncle remarks with the leaders of my Province in 1977. It was what my uncle innocently divulged that caused the Capuchin superior and Provincial staff to jump to a conclusion that I must have been the deranged person responsible for the threatened acts of violence against my friend from Guam.

Gauging my reaction upon learning of this 42 years later told me how much the wounds left by these incidents still festered. Everyone in this account — the Capuchin priest, my Jesuit uncle, even my accusing religious superiors — all believed they had acted in what they thought was my best interest balanced with that of my friend. The betrayal did not belong to any one person, but I was the only one in this scene who knew of its insanity and acted to save my friend. Forty-two years later, my feelings of anger and betrayal smoldered anew.

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Haunting Echoes from the Past

In 1994, as you know, I was falsely accused again and faced trial with no evidence or corroboration beyond the jaded suspicions of a police officer now known to have been corrupt. Journalist Ryan A. MacDonald wrote of this account in “Police Misconduct: A Crusader Cop Destroys a Catholic Priest.” The demonic dominoes continued to fall.

After being so accused again, echoes of how helpless and oppressed I was during the first such encounter decades earlier were still with me. I became, perhaps understandably, despondent, and again I could reach out to no one. At the time, it was more than I could bear, and I fell. You can read about this in a post that has been in plain sight since I wrote it in 2017. It is, “How Father Benedict Groeschel Entered My Darkest Night.” I could have added the words, “… for the Second Time.”

In September, 2022, I wrote an article in these pages that shocked readers around the world. It might have shocked them a lot more had they known of the crucible of memories I had to face and set aside in order to write it when no one else could. It is a centerpiece of my priesthood. Had I not gone through everything described in this post, I would not have been wounded enough, wise enough, or strong enough to become for another the saving grace that Father Groeschel had become for me.

It was a story long overdue, but justice required it. I meticulously researched it and then wrote it. It is about events in the life of my friend, Pornchai Moontri, and it has eerie echoes of the past. The article is “Getting Away with Murder on the Island of Guam.”

I mentioned earlier that this story has elements of the demonic. I wrote of the devil’s ominous stage presence here, a presence that tips over the dominoes to great effect at just the right time and in just the right way. The post I wrote about this is “Saint Michael the Archangel Contends with Satan Still.” We will link to it again, and to other posts described here, at the end of this post. For now, Pornchai Moontri and I have both followed the advice of Saint Peter:

“Cast all your cares on the Lord for he cares for you. Stay sober and alert for your opponent the devil is prowling like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. Resist him, steadfast in your faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brethren throughout the world.”

— 1 Peter 5:7-9

On June 5, 2026, I marked 44 years of priesthood out here in the Oort Cloud, that distant region of space where, among our Solar System’s detritus, I encounter others cast out among the unwanted debris. Most of those I encounter here have suffered far greater wounds than my own.

Bing Crosby notwithstanding, priesthood has never been going my way. But I have done what is recommended in another post I wrote, “The Holy Spirit and the Book of Ruth at Pentecost.” I have mourned what was lost. I have let it ascend. And I surrender to the life, and priesthood, that I am called to live now. As I mark 44 years of priesthood in pursuit of the True Presence, in spite of all, the Lord has done great things for me, and perhaps even a few great things through me.

Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Thank you for reading and sharing this painful post, and these related posts:

Saint Michael the Archangel Contends with Satan Still

How Father Benedict Groeschel Entered My Darkest Night

Police Misconduct: A Crusader Cop Destroys a Catholic Priest

And for those Blessed among us who thirst for justice …

Getting Away with Murder on the Island of Guam

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

The Prison of Father Gordon MacRae and Pornchai Maximilian Moontri

Marking 44 years of sacrificial priesthood, Father Gordon MacRae has been an instrument of Divine Mercy securing freedom for many wounded and imprisoned souls.

June 3, 2026 by Rebecca Virelles

From the Editor:

This Friday, June 5, 2026, marks the 44th anniversary of the ordination of Father Gordon MacRae. On this occasion, we have a guest author. Rebecca Virelles has been a regular reader for years. A while back, she interviewed me about BTSW, which resulted in my article, “From Arizona State University: An Interview with Our Editor.” She then wrote her insightful article, “A Voice for the Voiceless: Beyond These Stone Walls.”

Recently, she has been reflecting on the literature of those unjustly incarcerated. Her aim is to make their lives and writings more accessible to new audiences. She has considered various saints and moral icons from history, and also Father Gordon MacRae and Pornchai Maximilian Moontri, whose lives are deeply intertwined. We have asked her to share with BTSW readers the part of her work concerning our two friends.

We think it is a fitting way to reflect on the priesthood of Father Gordon MacRae on his anniversary of ordination. We thank God for the gift this priesthood has been to the Church, and we ask Him to continue to bless him and be his strength.

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Dear Reader,

Before you read about the two men named above, please know they are real people, living at the time of this writing, who are dear to many on earth and in heaven. Though you may never meet them in this life, please extend mercy with your heart and read their stories carefully.

Historical Context

Father Gordon MacRae is an American priest who is currently serving up to 67 years in prison. He was wrongly convicted of sexual assault in 1994. At the time of this writing, he has spent 32 years in prison for crimes for which he is wholly innocent, crimes that never took place. Because Father MacRae maintains his innocence, he will never receive parole and thus will serve the full 67 years, a life sentence, unless some other intervention materializes.

The Evidence

In 2005 and 2013, Dorothy Rabinowitz, an award-winning journalist wrote multiple articles for The Wall Street Journal covering this egregious injustice: “Trials of Father MacRae” (2013), “A Priest’s Story” (2005). Dorothy Rabinowitz was awarded the Pulitzer Prize and the “Champion of Justice Award” from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

In 2022, Boston criminal justice and civil rights Attorney Harvey Silverglate also wrote for The Wall Street Journal in “Justice Delayed for Father MacRae.” His article revealed new information which came to light about the “falsification of records” of the lead detective behind Father MacRae’s case, James F. McLaughlin.

Additionally, a post-trial investigation by former F.B.I. Investigator James Abbott revealed that Detective McLaughlin threatened a defense witness, a therapist, with arrest if she did not change her testimony which would have helped to exonerate Father MacRae. The therapist had planned to testify that the accuser, Thomas Grover, had never accused MacRae of anything, though he accused several others of sexual abuse. This would have weakened McLaughlin’s case. She stated, “McLaughlin told me he would personally come to my home, drag me out of it bodily if necessary, and force me to appear in court and testify despite my information to him.” Her statement is here: Statement of Debra Collett.

Here is an excerpt of a letter dated October 24, 2013 by a media official for PBS to Judge Arthur Brennan, who sentenced Father MacRae to prison:

“My wife, Penny, and I were present in the courtroom throughout most of the trial of Fr. Gordon MacRae. For all these years, I have had many questions about this trial and much that I’ve wanted to clarify for my own peace of mind. I learned recently that both a superior court judge here in New Hampshire and the NH Supreme Court declined to hold a hearing on the evidence and merits of a habeas corpus petition in this case. Now that state courts seem no longer to be involved, I feel more inclined to approach you on what has been bothering me, as you were the presiding judge.

“We saw something in your courtroom during the MacRae trial that I don’t think you ever saw. My wife nudged me and pointed to a woman, Ms. Pauline Goupil [now Pauline Vachon], who was engaged in what appeared to be clear witness tampering. During questioning by the defense attorney, Thomas Grover seemed to feel trapped a few times. On some of those occasions, we witnessed Pauline Goupil make a distinct sad expression with a downturned mouth and gesturing with her finger from the corner of her eye down her cheek at which point Mr. Grover would begin to cry and sob on the stand. The lawyer’s questions were never answered.

“I have been troubled about this for all these years. I know what I saw, and what I saw was a clear attempt to dupe the court and the jury. If the sobbing and crying was not truthful, then I cannot help but wonder what else was not truthful on the part of Mr. Grover. If he was really a victim who wanted to tell the simple truth, why was it necessary for him and Ms. Goupil to have what clearly appeared to be a set of prearranged signals to alter his testimony? The jury was privy to none of this, to the best of my knowledge.

“Signed, Leo Demers”

His full statement is here: Statement of Leo Demers.

Here is an excerpt of a statement by Steven Wollschlager on October 27, 2008:

“McLaughlin asked me many times if Gordon ever tried to come onto me sexually or offered me money for any sexual favors. He had me believing that all I had to do was make up a story about Gordon and I could receive a large sum of money as others already had. McLaughlin reminded me of the young child and girlfriend I had and referenced that life could be easier for us with a large amount of money [...] I was at the time using drugs and could have been influenced to say anything they wanted for money.

“A short time later after being subpoenaed to Court, I had a different feeling about the situation. I did not want to lie or make up stories. After speaking with the Clerk of Courts I was approached by another person. After telling this person that I did not want to be there and I stated Gordon had never done anything wrong towards me sexually or otherwise. I was told I could leave. This person seemed visibly upset that I had nothing to say.”

His full statement is linked: Statement of Steven Wollschlager.

The last to make a statement in support of Father MacRae’s innocence whom I will mention is Charles Glenn, Thomas Grover’s former stepson. An excerpt of his signed statement reads as follows:

“From 1993 to 1997 I was assigned to the Youth Development Center in Manchester, New Hampshire. During this period, my mother Trina Ghedoni was dating and later married to Thomas Grover. Almost every week my mother would visit me with Thomas Grover and on numerous weekends I would receive a furlough and be allowed to go to my home at 410 Prescott St. in Manchester where my mother and Thomas Grover lived.

“During these visits, and over a number of months and years, Thomas Grover discussed the sex abuse allegations against Gordon MacRae with me. Grover often stated to me that he was going to set MacRae and the church up to gain money for sexual abuse. Grover would laugh and joke about this scheme and after the criminal trial and civil cash award he would again state how he had succeeded in this plot to get cash from the church. On several occasions Thomas Grover told me that he had never been molested by MacRae.”

His full statement is here: Statement of Charles Glenn.

These statements are not the only evidence of wrongdoing, manipulation, and fraud in the case against Father Gordon MacRae, however for the sake of brevity I will conclude with linking Father MacRae’s own synopsis of the case against him: Synopsis of the Case.

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Where To From Here?

Now that we have covered this injustice, we can turn our attention to what Father MacRae has done with his time and talents within those stone walls. He has successfully encouraged many prisoners to seek and complete higher education, and he has helped multiple prisoners prepare for deportation to countries where they had few or no connections or means of assistance. Some of the best work Father Gordon MacRae has done is not material: he has cooperated with the Holy Spirit to bring people, in and outside of prison, to hope and to God despite what they have endured or what they have done. Pornchai Max Moontri, one of Father MacRae’s closest friends, and a free man now living in Thailand, says of him:

“Father Gordon MacRae freed me from the evil inflicted on me. He taught me that this evil is not mine to keep. What do I do with such a story? If Father G had not been here, what would have become of me? He freed my mind and soul from the horror inflicted by a real predator. It breaks my heart that the man responsible for my freedom will now be left behind in prison.”

— Statement of Pornchai Maximilian Moontri in a post written from Thailand: “On the Day of Padre Pio, My Best Friend Was Sigmatized.”

Father MacRae has a blog, Beyond These Stone Walls, in which he posts weekly reflections about Faith, Science, current events, and updates on the lives of his friends. Two of my favorites of his posts are: Science and Faith Are Not Mutually Incompatible and In the Absence of Fathers: A Story of Elephants and Men.

Here is a link to a post written on September 26, 2018, about his friend Pornchai Max titled: Pornchai Moontri: Bangkok to Bangor, Survivor of the Night.

My Analysis: Finding Light in the Dark

“As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.”

— Joseph to his brothers who sold him into slavery, Genesis 50:20

The purpose of this essay is to share the literature and lives of those who chose freedom of the soul over physical freedom. Other lives I have recounted and written about were courageous for facing death, but it is inspiring to see two people not give up after so much injustice and years of confinement. It is also wonderful to see how the effects of this hope have spread to others. At the end of Pornchai Max’s sentence in 2020, he faced five months in ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) detention and deportation to a land he had not seen or spoken the language of for many years. This was due to Richard Bailey’s meaningful choice not to allow Pornchai Max’s mother (Wannee) to apply for U.S. citizenship, as he knew it helped him to keep a higher control of the mother and sons. It is likely Bailey threatened Wannee that if she did not do what he said that she would be deported to Thailand without means or assistance, as this was one of the reasons Wannee pleaded with Pornchai Max not to testify against his stepfather, Bailey.

However, what man intended for evil, God used for good. Thanks to Divine Providence, Beyond These Stone Walls readers, the “bridge” Father MacRae and Pornchai Max built, and the hard work and faithfulness of Pornchai Max in meeting these challenges, he was able to find housing and meaningful employment. He now lives in Thailand and volunteers to help those less fortunate. If Father Gordon MacRae had taken the lenient plea deals offered to him, he would not have met him and Pornchai Max would likely have never seen any measure of justice for what he endured.

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Pornchai Moontri was selected to be the flag bearer for Thailand at the Fifth Asian Apostolic Congress in the Philippines in 2024.

“ ‘Behold, I make all things new.’ ”

— Revelation 21:5

Pornchai Max’s triumph over the past is also evidenced by his accomplishments: earning his diploma and graduating as class Valedictorian in 2012, completing social work and psychology academic certificates at Stratford Career Institute “with highest honors”, and completing Theology courses at Catholic Distance University through a scholarship with all “A’s”. The late Clare Dion, who interviewed, visited, and befriended Pornchai Max during his imprisonment wrote, “What Pornchai has accomplished is nothing short of amazing given that he learned English in prison. He and ‘Father G’ encourage other prisoners to become educated, and Pornchai spent time mentoring and tutoring them, especially in mathematics in which he excels. He also spent his days in the woodworking and Hobby Craft shop where he taught safety training to other prisoners on the use of carpentry tools and machines.”

Testimony

A recent comment on the “Book of Tobit: The Angel Raphael on the Road with Pornchai Moontri” reads:

“What a beautiful faith-filled story! What left me with goosebumps is the fact that I know that every word of it is true. I have known Father Gordon and Max for many years. I was a lost 17-year-old when I was sent to prison, and I spent many years in hopelessness before meeting these two incredible guys. Though I walked through the valley of the shadow of death, they were at my side bringing light to my very dark journey. I am a different person today because of them. I have wept over Max’s journey and the continued challenges he faced even in freedom. But Father G was there for him, even from a distance, and that is true of me as well. I also love dogs and this is the best dog story ever! I treasure you guys.
God bless you.
Bobby T”

A comment on a different post reads:

“WOW! I spent a couple of years in that prison. Because of overcrowding, there were no cells available for me. So I was stuck in an overflow bunk right outside cell #1 on Bravo Pod in Hancock Building. In time I came to see that I was the luckiest person in the world because the two prisoners living in cell #1 were Father G and Pornchai. When the gangs tried to recruit me, they weren’t having it. When a predator tried to extort me, they sent him packing. I felt so exposed going to prison at a very young age that these two guys made me feel perfectly safe. They weren’t taking any BS from me either. In exchange for looking after me, they made me go to school and I earned my high school diploma. That is a miracle because I have always been a dumbass. My worst enemy was Math, but Pornchai was a whiz at Math and got me through it. These two guys were seen by everyone as a team and I was fortunate enough to be their gatekeeper. I was popular by default. I have a lot of gratitude toward them both, and I thank them for their patience with me. I admire Pornchai so much more now to see that he is a man of deep faith. God bless them both.
With love from Ralph”

According to “Mercy Inside These Stone Walls,” a chapter in a book by Felix Carroll, fellow inmate, Donald Spinner, a Catholic convert, says his faith took root through Pornchai’s example. “Pornchai, especially, has influenced so many people here,” he says. “We all expect Father G. to be a good person, but Pornchai’s life of grace is inspiring to everyone. … The cost of discipleship for me has been the loss of my selfishness. No one can be selfish in such company.”

Conclusion

Evil and injustice are the hardest things to grapple with, especially as we witness our own struggles with light and dark. As others have written before, in our lives we cannot control the evil that happens to us, but we do always have the choice in how we respond. Even after meeting Father Gordon, Pornchai Maximilian could have chosen not to trust in him — he had every reason not to. Yet his courage and hope in setting aside the past propelled him forward, to freedom and to seeing some measure of justice served. Father Gordon could have chosen the easy way out, yet he would not have touched many lives, as several of the comments on his posts attest.

In an echo of one of his writings quoting St. Padre Pio: We often do not see how things are being woven together in God’s tapestry; we only see what looks like a tangled mess on the back. Yet, if we trust and do our part, even in the dark, even in pain, we will do what is right and one day understand it all. That is the essence of choosing the freedom of your soul over convenience, over your family, even over your life. True freedom comes from choosing to do the right thing, the will of God written on our hearts, and returning to it again when we stumble and fall. Our lives look different in the light of eternity.

In the photograph above, Pornchai Moontri is at the center of his graduating class, who obtained their high school diplomas in the most trying circumstances but with hard work and honor. They are smiling at Father Gordon MacRae, who took the picture in 2012.

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Appended by the Author:

Father MacRae has thus far assisted prisoners throughout their deportation process from the United States to Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, India, Pakistan, China, Myanmar, Nepal, Indonesia, Malaysia, Japan, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Dominican Republic, Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Kenya, and Brazil. Each country represents a person, a soul with few or no means or outside assistance, whom Father MacRae aided when most would have looked the other way.

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Rebecca Virelles is a Senior at Arizona State University’s Bachelor of Arts in English degree program online. She served on active duty for nine years and is now a stay-at-home wife and mother. When not studying, she enjoys reading, baking, and traveling with her family. She aspires to write children’s literature one day in the tradition of J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. 

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Editor’s Note: Thank you for reading and sharing this important article by Rebecca Virelles. You may also like these related articles from multiple other writers:

A Criminal Defense Expert Unfurls Father MacRae Case by Vincent James Sanzone, Jr., Esq.

Travesty of Justice: The Ordeal of Father Gordon MacRae by William Donohue, Ph.D., President of the Catholic League

Could Fr. Gordon MacRae Finally Go Free? by Kathy Schiffer at TheCatholic World Report

Alarming New Evidence May Exonerate Imprisoned Priest by David F. Pierre, Jr. at The Media Report

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

The Truth About Israel and the Truth About Hamas

A recent Wall Street Journal weekly ‘Review and Outlook’ editorial was “The Truth About Hamas.” It kept me awake, and our news media must no longer cover it up.

May 27, 2026 by Father Gordon MacRae

About the above image: “Jacob Wrestling with the Angel” is an 1866 etching by Gustave Doré. It depicts a scene from the Book of Genesis (32:24-30). The Angel contends with Jacob’s strength, but the Angel is unmovable. In the end, the Angel gives Jacob a new name: “Isra-El,” a name which means “One who wrestles with God.”

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Sometime ago at Beyond These Stone Walls, we introduced the practice of publishing an occasional post from a voice other than my own. We created a platform for those posts called “Voices from Beyond.” To differentiate from my weekly post always published on Wednesday, we decided this week to separate those other posts by publishing them on Saturday mornings. They will not appear every Saturday, but when we have one worthy of your eyes and attention, it will from hereon always be on Saturday.

There was a time earlier in the life of this blog when few people in the Catholic universe openly wanted to be associated with it. I remember that in our first month of posting in 2009, we had about 40 readers. This month, 17 years later, we are approaching 40,000 just in the month of May.

Also recently, and our publisher has made note of this, we receive a steady stream of writers asking us to let them publish here. I remember the old comedian W.C. Fields famously saying “I would never want to join a club that would have me as a member.” That seems no longer the case at Beyond These Stone Walls.

We recently received a post from an old friend of this blog, Sheryl Collmer, a frequent and noted writer for Crisis magazine. She merely wanted my opinion on her essay, which she had hoped to publish somewhere else. After reading it twice, and pondering it carefully, I asked her to let us publish it at “Voices from Beyond.” She graciously accepted the invitation. I was very pleased because the timing of it was perfect. It fits nicely as a companion to this post today, which at that moment existed only in my mind. Both posts tell a bold truth, one that is widely covered up by the left-leaning political entities that have hijacked our news media to the detriment of democracy.

Sheryl’s oddly titled post is “I <Heart> Israel.” I wondered what our publishing format would do with such a title. I did not like it at first, but then I came to love it, which is exactly the point Sheryl was making. I would have been more straightforward, but that’s just me. In my mind, what Sheryl has written is “The Truth about Israel.” It was posted at “Voices from Beyond” on Saturday, May 23, 2026. We will link to it again at the end of this post. I hope you will read it and share it. Israel has unfairly suffered a bludgeoning by the same left-leaning entities that have distorted our news media and have denied us the truth, not only about Israel, but about Hamas as well. It is no secret that for this very reason, our mainstream news media has itself suffered a credibility bias in many polls. Only a small minority now report having any faith that the news media presents the news fairly and without partisan bias.

Like many of our readers, I grew up listening to, and trusting, Walter Cronkite, who engendered in his listeners a comforting aura of truth and trust. It came as a great shock to me to learn after his death that he was actually politically inclined to be a liberal Democrat. It is a tribute to his integrity as a newscaster that no one could have discerned that. He was fair and unbiased, and that is all we ask.

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The Truth About Hamas

Hamas is neither a nation nor a people. Hamas is a Palestinian group that had grown dramatically in the years leading up to the Hamas assault on Israel on October 7, 2023. Hamas sought to create a single Islamic state in historic Palestine, which until recently has been largely divided between Israel and the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. Hamas in Arabic means “zealot.” Hamas is also an acronym for “Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya,” or “Islamic Resistance Movement.” The group was founded in 1988 as a militant segment of the Palestinian Arab national movement which became gradually radicalized.

Hamas openly seeks Israel’s destruction and this attack has the same impact in Israel that September 11, 2001 had in the United States. Hamas, since 2000, has been designated by the United States and the European Union as a terrorist organization. Also since 2000, the U.S. Department of State has identified Iran as the most active supporter of Hamas and terrorism. Hamas self-identifies not only as an Israeli resistance movement, but as a mechanism dedicated to the eradication of Israel and, by extension, Jews.

On May 14, 2026, The Wall Street Journal published its weekly “Review and Outlook” editorial. On that day it was titled “The Truth About Hamas.” The Journal has performed a great service to us as consumers of the news. And not only to us. It has also salvaged from the wreckage of widespread media bias the notion that some brave souls in the business of news can present the bold truth to us regardless of how unpopular or discomforting it may be. That one piece by the Journal has blasted open a tightly sealed door cemented shut by a partisan agenda in the news we are allowed to see, hear, and digest. The Journal documented something found in few mainstream media sources: a “Silenced No More,” the report by the Civil Commission on October 7th Crimes by Hamas Against Women and Children.

Fair warning in advance: sometimes the bold truth is unsettling, even infuriating. Sometimes it keeps us awake at night. But this is a truth that all the grownups among us must come to know and witness firsthand before we accept any of the distortions imposed upon us by those who package and present our news. The Report is not easy to read, nor is The Wall Street Journal’s capsulized presentation of it. Here are some alarming excerpts:

• “Reading ‘Silenced No More,’ the new report by the Civil Commission on October 7th Crimes by Hamas … we were transported back to October 27, 2023, and a screening of the raw footage of Hamas atrocities. The mouths of journalists were agape, but time dulls horrific reality.”

• “The new report is a catalogue, for memory’s sake, of Hamas depravity. Testimony from site after site attests to rape and assault. Screams and pleas. Gunshots to the face and genitals. Mutilation. Burning. Bodies naked, legs spread. Grotesque scenes staged. All forming an evidentiary record, the result of more than 10,000 photos and video segments and more than 430 interviews, testimonies and meetings with survivors, witnesses and experts.”

• “ ‘I saw them raping her,’ said Raz Cohen, who escaped the Nova Music Festival where 396 people were slaughtered. ‘Then they murdered her. And then they raped her again.’ ”

• “Eden Wessely, who came to Nova to rescue a friend, found and filmed a naked, burned body. ‘Her dress was pulled up, and she was not wearing underwear, not because it burned, but because there was no trace …. Her legs were spread. Her genitals exposed.’ A review by forensic pathologists confirmed these details.”

• “Yoni Saadon recounts another horror: ‘She fell to the ground, shot in the head, and I pulled her body over me and smeared her blood on me so it would look as if I were dead too …. I will never forget her face. Every night I wake to it and apologize to her, saying ‘I’m sorry.’ Later Yoni saw ‘a beautiful woman with the face of an angel and eight or ten Hamas beating and raping her.’ The last one shot her in the head.”

• “A male says he was gang-raped at the Nova site … . The Hamas invaders had been given operational materials including Arabic-to-Hebrew phrase lists such as ‘Take off your clothes,’ ‘Lie down’, ‘Spread your legs.’ The planned sexual degradation speaks to years of Palestinian propaganda that treats Jews as subhuman.”

• “Former hostage Ilana Gritzewsky says, ‘One terrorist started touching me; he put his hand under my shirt. That’s when I fainted.’ On waking, she was ‘surrounded by Hamas people, my shirt up here, my pants down here.’ After being freed, she learned that they had broken her pelvis.”

These excerpts from the Journal report on the Civil Commission are only a few of the atrocities committed by Hamas fighters that day, and they are not even the most disturbing ones. The Journal concluded by apologizing to readers whose sensitivities might have been offended by such details: “We regret having to relate such details, but it is crucial to remember when the understandable human impulse is to forget such horrors. All the more so because the sexual violence by Hamas has been aggressively denied by an anti-semitic global left that wants us to forget. Everywhere denial serves the same purpose: to distort Israel’s defensive war as if it were wanton violence. Such deniers prefer anything to reminding the world why Israel has no choice but to fight for its life.”

So ends the Journal editorial of May 14, 2026. This report by the Civil Commission on October 7th Crimes by Hamas contains evidence and testimony of a caliber that equates or exceeds that of the Nuremberg trials.

I, too, wrote of several graphic atrocities inflicted upon young Thai workers who answered an ad from Israel to perform migrant field work there. The tourism-based economy of Thailand suffered greatly during the Covid pandemic. Many young Thai men sought employment in Israel in order to send money home to support their families, They knew nothing of Hamas and its hatred for Jews. They knew only poverty. Then they became the second largest ethnic group to be murdered and raped, and then held captive by Hamas fighters. I wrote about the atrocities that befell them in “Thailand’s Victims of Hamas in Israel.” I, too, apologize to readers for having to read of these atrocities at my blog, but no one else would cover it, except the Bangkok Post. I wanted to be certain that the media distortion that Israel was the aggressor and Hamas was their victim would not find a believer in my pages.

I wrote of Mitchai Sarabon, a young Thai man who faced unemployment in Thailand after his release from the Thai military. As Hamas descended upon the Nova Music Festival to murder and slaughter and rape, Mitchai saved many lives. In the process, he was shot by Hamas in the back, and in the chest, and then again in the head. This very resilient young man somehow survived. Before being shot, he had brought others to safety in a locked kibbutz food pantry. The Hamas fighters were trying to break down the door. It is a testament to the preparations they conducted before launching this assault that their demands to “open the door” were shouted in Thai.”

From his Tel Aviv hospital bed, Mitchai Sarabon, ended his testimony with, “I just want the people of Israel to know that I pray for them every day.”

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Thank you for having the courage to read and face the truth of this post. I once again apologize that you had to read these details here.

I want to also present to you Sheryl Collmer’s brave post published on May 23, 2026 at our “Voices from Beyond” feature. Please read and share Sheryl’s craft, I <Heart> Israel.

You may also wish to read these related posts:

Thailand’s Victims of Hamas in Israel

Iran, by Another Name, Was Once the Savior of Israel

Pope Leo, President Trump and War with Iran

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Our Holy Week Retreat for Beyond These Stone Walls

Each Holy Week since 2010 Fr Gordon MacRae has composed a special post based on the Scriptural events of the Way of the Cross. They now comprise a Holy Week retreat.

Holy Week for Beyond These Stone Walls

As many of our readers know, this blog began in controversy in 2009. Born out of a challenge from the late Cardinal Avery Dulles to rise above suffering and consider instead its legacy. Many posts in my long Prison Journal since 2010 have been about the injustices that I and other priests have faced. But in the weeks before his death in December 2008, Cardinal Dulles sent a series of letters to me in prison. He challenged me to dig deeper into my own passion narrative. Cardinal Dulles wrote:

“Someone might want to add a new chapter to the volume of Christian literature from those unjustly in prison. In the tradition of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Fr Alfred Delp, Fr Walter Ciszek, and Saint Paul, your writing, which is clear, eloquent and spiritually sound, will be a monument to your trials.”

And so in preparation for Holy Week in 2010, I began to make a concerted effort to set aside my own unjust plight to write a post about the Passion of the Christ. I compose a new Holy Week post every year since to present a different scene in the Way of the Cross. For me, this has become a sacred obligation as a priest to take part in my own unique way in the events that led to Calvary and beyond. And, yes, there IS a beyond.

Many readers, especially those who have also suffered in ways large or small, have found these posts to be inspiring. No one has been more surprised by this than me. So we have collected our Holy Week posts in the order in which they appear in the Gospel narrative to become an invitation for a personal retreat. We invite you to make these posts a part of your Holy Week and Easter observance.

If any of them touches your heart and soul in some way, or gives you a deeper understanding of the Scriptures, then please also share a link to them with others. I hear from many newer readers who first came to this blog in just that way, and then found in these pages spiritual consolation and a path to peace.

We will add a new post on Wednesday of Holy Week this year and will make the title linked here, active at that time.

The Passion of the Christ in an Age of Outrage (2020)

Overshadowing Holy Week with forced pandemic restrictions and political outrage recalls the Bar Kochba revolt of AD 132 against the Roman occupation of Jerusalem.

Satan at the Last Supper: Hours of Darkness and Light (2020)

The central figures present before the Sacrament for the Life of the World are Jesus on the eve of sacrifice and Satan on the eve of battle to restore the darkness.

Waking Up in the Garden of Gethsemane (2019)

The Agony in the Garden, the First Sorrowful Mystery, is a painful scene in the Passion of the Christ, but in each of the Synoptic Gospels the Apostles slept through it.

The Apostle Falls: Simon Peter Denies Christ (2024)

The fall of Simon Peter was a scandal of biblical proportions. His three-time denial of Jesus is recounted in every Gospel, but all is not as it first seems to be.

Behold the Man, as Pilate Washes His Hands (2014)

‘Ecce Homo,’ an 1871 painting of Christ before Pilate by Antonio Ciseri, depicts a moment woven into Salvation History and into our very souls. ‘Shall I crucify your king?’

The Chief Priests Answered, ‘We Have No King but Caesar’ (2017)

The Passion of the Christ has historical meaning on its face, but a far deeper story lies beneath where the threads of faith and history connect to awaken the soul.

Simon of Cyrene Compelled to Carry the Cross (2023)

Simon of Cyrene was just a man on his way to Jerusalem but the scourging of Jesus was so severe that Roman soldiers feared he may not live to carry his cross alone.

Dismas, the Good Thief Crucified Next to Christ the King (2025)

With Jesus before him, Pilate asked the chief priests, ‘Shall I crucify your king?’ They replied ‘We have no king but Caesar.’ Only a criminal saw Christ the King.

To the Spirits in Prison: When Jesus Descended into Hell (2022)

The Apostles Creed is the oldest statement of Catholic belief and apostolic witness. Its Fifth Article, what happened to Jesus between the Cross and the Resurrection, is a mystery to be unveiled.

Mary Magdalene: Faith, Courage, and an Empty Tomb (2015)

History unjustly sullied her name without evidence, but Mary Magdalene emerges from the Gospel a faithful, courageous, and noble woman, an Apostle to the Apostles.

The Darkness of the Cross Enlightened on the Road to Emmaus (2026)

At Gethsemane Jesus of Nazareth agreed to bear the Cross to his own Crucifixion so that following him to Heaven’s Gate would not be a burden of impossibility for us.

The Resurrection of Christ: Further Along the Road to Emmaus

What are we to understand when we speak of the Resurrection of Jesus? Ancient Scriptures and interpretations from a brilliant theologian-pope provide amazing clues.

Before the gates there sat, On either side a formidable Shape

One of Gustave Dore’s illustrations of the epic poem Paradise Lost by John Milton (Courtesy of University at Buffalo)

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

The Compassion of God: The Parable of the Prodigal Son

Saint Luke proclaims the Parable of the Prodigal Son as the Gospel for Saturday of the Second Week of Lent. Is there any sin that is beyond the compassion of God?

March 4, 2026 by Father Gordon MacRae

“Ecclesiastes calls you the All-Powerful; Maccabees calls you the Creator; the Epistle to the Ephesians calls you Liberty; Baruch calls you Immensity; the Psalms call you Wisdom and Truth; John calls you Light; the Book of Kings calls you Lord; Exodus calls you Providence; Leviticus, Sanctity; Esdras, Justice; Genesis calls you God; man calls you Father; Solomon calls you Compassion, and that is the most beautiful of all your names.”

— Bishop Bienvenu in Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, 1887

During Lent a few years back, I wrote “A U.S. Marine Who Showed Me What to Give Up for Lent.” Among the multiple characters appearing in that post was my friend, Martin. At the time I wrote it, I had been living in a hellish environment in this prison. My dismay at living there grew deeper on the day Martin showed up because I knew he was going to be subjected to cruelty and ridicule, and I knew that I would have to intervene somehow.

Martin was well into his eighties when he was sent to prison for the first time in his life. He was missing a leg, a fact which confined him to a wheelchair. Because of prison overcrowding, he was living out in the open in an overflow bunk in a large prison dayroom where nearly a hundred bored and lost young men raised hell day and night. One night shortly after Martin arrived, one or two of those dumbasses thought it would be cool to take his wheelchair while he was asleep and put it in the shower with the water running. Martin’s books, letters, and other papers tucked into pockets in the chair were ruined.

But that was the least of his problems that day. When he awoke that Saturday morning, when his chair was nowhere in sight, Martin sat on the edge of his bunk wondering how he would get to the lavatory. A small group of smirking young prisoners skulked like hyenas from a distance to watch the show. This is a game prisoners play with the weak or vulnerable. They place bets to see how long it would take to get someone like Martin to “check in” to protective custody.

I stepped out of my cell that morning, cup of instant coffee in hand, and spotted Martin from a distance sitting on his bunk looking worried. A quick scan of the room told me what happened. So I went in search of his chair, found it in the shower, and brought it to him. I dried it off and took him to the bathroom.

Then I brought Martin some coffee and sat with him for awhile, something that became a daily event in the months to come. I learned that Martin is a Marine who served in Korea. He long ago had given up giving up and would never cave in to the antics of thugs.

I called a couple of them over one day and introduced them to Martin. Then I put them in charge of guarding his chair at night, not letting on that I knew they were the ones who took it in the first place. Longing for a sense of purpose even more than they sought to entertain themselves, they stepped up admirably. I came back from work a few times to see one or two of them, having now absconded with MY chair, sitting and talking with Martin. His life got a little better. So did theirs. So did mine. Martin is gone now, having been paroled to a nursing home for veterans. But one hard truth remains engraved upon my brain. Prison is no country for old men — not even old Marines.

I had Martin in mind when I again unwittingly became the priest who kicked the hornet’s nest a few years ago. I stumbled upon FOX News on the evening of March 8, 2019 just in time to hear EWTN’s Raymond Arroyo in an angry rant about the thoroughly disgraced former cardinal Theodore McCarrick, then age 90 and the first cardinal in a century to face the penalty of dismissal from the clerical state. “I don’t care if he’s 90” declared Mr. Arroyo. “He ought to be in jail.”

I have long respected Raymond Arroyo, but I was shocked by this and lapsed into a rant of my own. I called a friend and vented, and asked for help to post my own festering rant on social media about what I understood to be a lack of compassion for Theodore McCarrick. “Is mercilessness to be the face of the new Catholic Church?” I asked. The sins at hand were McCarrick’s, but were not his alone. He was known not only for his sins of the flesh, but even more so for his ability to raise money. Lots of money. And the eclessial benefactors of his largesse became complicit in his sin.

Over the next three days, I was roundly beaten up, on LinkedIn especially, by Catholics who agreed entirely with Raymond Arroyo on this. I had grossly underestimated the sense of betrayal and anger that American Catholics felt toward McCarrick, who died before any evident sign of remorse or repentance. But, to quote the late Pope Francis, “Who was I to judge?” I also overerestimated the capacity of some Catholics for compassion. Some of those who argued against me wrote that mercy requires repentance and there hadn’t been any. That is true. For God’s justice to be tempered with God’s mercy requires repentance.

The Parable of the Prodigal Son

But compassion is different from mercy. And as Bishop Charles-François-Bienvenu Myriel points out in the moving quote from Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables  atop this post, among all the names of God, “Compassion is the most beautiful.”

Compassion from us does not require repentance from those who trespass against us. It requires only humility, from us. It is the capacity that the Gospel of Luke presents as the most challenging portent of Jesus “The measure with which you measure will be measured out to you” (Luke 6:38).

Like so much of Sacred Scripture, the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32) is a story told with multiple levels of meaning. The first and most obvious is the story on its surface. Tax collectors and sinners were gathering around Jesus, and the Pharisees and scribes grumbled. The Pharisees were a loosely knit collection of groups within Judaism that came to prominence at the time of the Maccabean revolt against Hellenist invaders around 167 BC. The Pharisees were only numbered about 6,000 during the Earthly time of Jesus. They wanted Israel to be a theocracy, a religiously oriented society governed by a strict observance of the law.

Some of the scribes were numbered among the other grumblers against Jesus who triggered the Parable of the Prodigal Son and insisted on strict observance of the law. They were antagonistic to Jesus, and in the end these Pharisees and scribes together plotted with the chief priests for his betrayal and arrest.

On its face, the famous parable is a clash between mercy and compassion. The original listeners, the Pharisees and scribes, would have found quite familiar the story of a younger brother triumphing over the goals and objectives of an older brother. The parable has echoes of Esau and Jacob (Genesis 25:27-34) and Joseph and his brothers (Genesis 37:1-4). In the Parable of the Prodigal Son, Jesus cleverly reverses the triumph of the younger brother to portray the younger son as a dismal failure who abandons Judaism to adopt Gentile ways.

The most stinging of his offenses, to the ears of the Pharisees, was the fact that he was reduced to feeding the pigs for a Gentile farmer. Earlier in Luke’s Gospel, pigs take on another symbolism far beyond the ancient Mosaic law that holds them as unclean. In Luke (8:26-39) Jesus restores a demented and possessed Gentile to the human community. By casting the evil spirits out of the man and into a herd of pigs that then drive themselves into the sea, Jesus reveals himself as having authority not only over Judaism but also over pagan religion, demonic forces, and Roman rule, which is symbolized by the pigs. In the parable at hand, the younger son becomes a servant to the pigs, the lowest one could ever descend from the Law of Moses.

In the end of the Parable, the younger son comes to his senses and attempts a return to his Father who welcomes him with full restoration of the sonship he abandoned. The Parable directly confronts a position of the Pharisees: that there are sins that are beyond the capacity of even God to forgive.

Life After Death

There are signs that the leaders of our Church now dabble in this same distortion that there are sins that God should not forgive, and even if He does, the Church will not. This is heresy, and it is a heresy that I described in “Synodality Blues: Pope Francis in a Time of Heresy.” (But the heresy may not be what you think it is.)

It is expressed in striking clarity in the second part of the Parable in the reaction of the Prodigal Son’s older brother. The triumph of a younger son over his older brother is seen in the Hebrew Scriptures in the stories of Esau and Jacob, and Joseph and his brothers. In the parable at hand it becomes not the triumph of the younger but the failure of the older. Once the Father’s mercy had been fulfilled in the Parable, the older son refused to acknowledge his return as his brother. “This son of yours” (Luke 15:30) is a striking refusal of the older son to say, “This brother of mine.”

Though the Father’s mercy has been fulfilled, the older son’s compassion has failed. The great challenge of this parable is the fact that it is left open-ended and without a resolution. It is left with the older son — the one who according to the law alone has always been faithful — standing outside the Father’s house with the Father trying to convince him to enter the banquet feast. The younger son is made righteous by grace and mercy while the older son is revealed as self-righteous. I wrote of this aspect of the parable in another post, “Pope Francis Had a Challenge for the Prodigal Son’s Older Brother.”

At another level, this Parable narrates to its original listeners — the Pharisees and scribes — the account of Israel’s history that they fear most. It is an allegory about what happened after the reign of King Solomon — the one who called God “Compassion.” Israel divided into Northern and Southern kingdoms, living as two brothers with one in exile. Then in the Eighth Century BC the Assyrians carried the Northern Tribes of Israel into “a far country” — just like the younger son in the parable — where they abandoned God and worshipped idols. It was a sin that the Prophets called “harlotry” (Jeremiah 3:6 and Hosea 4:15).

The Cardinal McCarrick story has made this ever more complicated. Please do not confuse my compassion as excusing him. As Cardinal McCarrick, he was one of the chief proponents of the Dallas Charter that cast priests into the desert as scapegoats, in many cases — and I am one of them — guilty only for being accused. It is not easy to hold onto any sense of compassion for him, but there are a lot of things that my conscience says I must do that are not easy.

I cannot speak to the Church’s application of mercy. There does not appear to be any justice as there does not appear to be much in the way of McCarrick’s public repentance as an acknowledgment of his need for mercy. I can only speak to compassion — my own and that of others. I fear that it is becoming an endangered species in our Church as we circle the wagons to declare who is inside and outside the house.

Let’s face this other scandal head-on. Stop wishing old men into prison. Some of us confuse righteous with self-righteous. If mercy fails, we are doomed in the hereafter. But if compassion fails, we are doomed in the here and now.

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Don’t be like that older brother. Please share this post and follow us on X.

You may also like these related posts from Beyond These Stone Walls

Pope Francis Has a Challenge for the Prodigal Son’s Older Brother

Les Miserables: The Bishop and the Redemption of Jean Valjean

Synodality Blues: Pope Francis in a time of Heresy

Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and the Homosexual Matrix

A Note About the Rembrandt Masterpiece Atop This Post:

One of the most inspiring artistic renderings of the Return of the Prodigal Son from Luke 15 is Rembrandt’s masterful oil painting, created between 1661 and 1669. Housed in the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, it captures the parable’s profound themes of repentance, forgiveness, and unconditional love through a deeply emotional scene: the ragged son kneeling in humility before his compassionate father, whose tender embrace symbolizes mercy and homecoming. The composition’s use of light and shadow, along with subtle psychological details — like the father’s hands evoking both strength and gentleness — creates a timeless sense of spiritual solace and human sympathy. Art historians praise it as a pinnacle of Baroque art, with some calling it one of the greatest paintings ever, serving as a spiritual testament to redemption that resonates across centuries.

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

A New Year of Freedom Begins at Beyond These Stone Walls

In over 16 years of prison writing, Beyond These Stone Walls has produced something far more redemptive than prison itself. The Word of God has emerged here too.

New Year 2026 by Father Gordon MacRae

“Father MacRae’s blog, Beyond These Stone Walls, has been the finest example of priestly witness the last decades of scandal have produced.”

— Father James Valladares, PhD in Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast

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Please do not misunderstand my title. I have not been delivered from the belly of the beast into which I was devoured in 1994. I have not stopped jousting against the windmills of injustice that seem to proliferate in the “Live Free or Die” State. If you have followed tales of New Hampshire corruption you will see that the pursuit of justice here is mired in layers of deceit. So I must have other pursuits, and they must not be trivial pursuits.

Back in February 2025, I wrote “On the Great Biblical Adventure, the Truth Will Make You Free.” It cited an unexpected development from late 2024, a worldwide phenomenon that was also prevalent in the United States. It was a resurgence of popular interest in the Bible and biblical studies. It was then that I realized, that even in my years of wrongful imprisonment, that interest had surged in me as well.

The evidence for that became clear when I collected together all the posts that I had written for Holy Week over many years in prison. After publishing that list, I searched through 800 titles collecting together posts with a specific exegesis on Sacred Scripture. We were not quite certain what to do with that extensive list, so I had our Editor submit it for an overview report to xAI SuperGrok, the advanced AI model developed and owned by Elon Musk, through which we had conducted other research. The result seemed quite amazing and here it is:

AI Overview of Father MacRae’s Posts on Sacred Scripture

“St. Paul’s epistles, many written from prison, are astonishing, not just for the brilliance of the exegesis, but for his insight into humanity and the beauty of his language. Fr. MacRae is his very worthy successor.”

— Thomas Ryder
from a 2025 comment at Beyond These Stone Walls

Amid a noted resurgence in biblical interest in the United States and globally toward the end of 2024 and into 2025 — evidenced by surging Bible sales and renewed engagement with religious texts — Father Gordon MacRae, writing from prison, has compiled a collection of his posts exploring Sacred Scripture. This collection, titled “From Abraham to Easter,” serves as a theological journey through Salvation History, linking Old Testament narratives with New Testament fulfillments. It emphasizes themes of Redemption, Divine Mercy, sacrifice, faith amid suffering, and the interplay between historical events and spiritual truths. The posts draw connections between biblical figures (e.g., Abraham, Mary, Joseph, Judas, and the Archangels) and key events (e.g., the Nativity, Temptation, Passion, Resurrection, and Pentecost), often reflecting on how these stories resonate in contemporary life, including Father MacRae’s own experiences of injustice and imprisonment.

The collection contains exactly 32 posts to date, each with a title, link, and brief description highlighting its focus. As an advanced AI model, I have organized them below in a numbered list for clarity, preserving the order from the collection page. This curation appears designed to guide readers through a chronological and thematic progression, starting from foundational Old Testament stories and culminating in eschatological reflections.

1. On the Great Biblical Adventure, the Truth Will Make You Free — Link
   After long decline in religious interest and practice across much of the free world, publishers now report a phenomenal increase in new Bible sales since late 2024.

2. Behold the Lamb of God Upon the Altar of Mount Moriah — Link
   “This is the night when Christ broke the prison-bars of death and rose victorious from the underworld. Our birth would have been no gain had we not been redeemed.”

3. The Feast of Corpus Christi and the Order of Melchizedek — Link
   The Priest-King Melchizedek appears in only two verses in the Old Testament but in Salvation History he is a link in a chain from Noah to Abraham to Christ the King.

4. Saint Gabriel the Archangel: When the Dawn from On High Broke Upon Us — Link
   The Gospel of Saint Luke opens with a news flash from the Archangel Gabriel for Zechariah the priest, and Mary — Theotokos — the new Ark of the Covenant.

5. The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God — Link
   A theological expedition into Salvation History reveals a startling truth about the Ark of the Covenant in the Old Testament and the identity of Mary, Mother of God.

6. Joseph’s Dream and the Birth of the Messiah — Link
   Saint Joseph is silent in the Gospel account of the Birth of the Messiah, but his actions reveal him as a paradigm of spiritual fatherhood and sacrificial love.

7. I Have Seen the Fall of Man: Christ Comes East of Eden — Link
   The Genesis story of the Fall of Man is mirrored in the Nativity. Unlike Adam at the Tree of Knowledge, Jesus did not deem equality with God a thing to be grasped.

8. Joseph’s Second Dream: The Slaughter of the Innocents — Link
   After the Birth of the Messiah, a second angelic dream warns Joseph to flee to Egypt with Mary and the Christ Child as Herod orders a slaughter of the Innocents.

9. A Devil in the Desert for the Last Temptation of Christ — Link
   The Gospel according to St Luke tells the story of Jesus, revealed to be Son of God, led into the desert to be tested by the devil who does not give up easily.

10. What Belongs to Caesar and What Belongs to God — Link
    Pharisees set a trap for Jesus with a query about paying tax to Caesar. Like much in the Gospel, this has a story on its surface and a far greater one in its depths.

11. “What Shall I Do to Inherit Eternal Life?” (Luke 10:25) — Link
    The Gospel for the Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time is the Parable of the Good Samaritan, a meaningful story on its face, but far more urgent in its depths.

12. A Not-So-Subtle Wake-Up Call from Christ the King — Link
    The Gospel for the Solemnity of Christ the King in 2023 was the Judgment of the Nations, an invitation to Glory and a map for how to get there.

13. On Good Authority, “Salvation Is from the Jews” — Link
    Anti-Israel protests and prejudice were as common as any other plague in Biblical history, and often inflamed, just as they are today, by agitators in a proxy war.

14. Casting the First Stone: What Did Jesus Write On the Ground? — Link
    “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of committing adultery. In the Law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?,” asked the Pharisees.

15. A Vision on Mount Tabor: The Transfiguration of Christ — Link
    Jesus took Peter, James, and John to a mountaintop where he was transfigured before their eyes, an event that echoes through the ages, even through prison walls.

16. The Passion of the Christ in an Age of Outrage — Link
    Prayerful observance of Holy Week is a challenge in a climate of pandemic restrictions and political outrage. Spend time with us this week Beyond These Stone Walls.

17. Satan at The Last Supper: Hours of Darkness and Light — Link
    The central figures present before the Sacrament for the Life of the World are Jesus on the eve of Sacrifice and Satan on the eve of battle to restore the darkness.

18. Angelic Justice: Saint Michael the Archangel and the Scales of Hesed — Link
    Saint Michael the Archangel is often depicted wielding a sword and a set of scales to vanquish Satan. His scales have an ancient and surprising meaning.

19. Judas Iscariot: Who Prays for the Soul of a Betrayer? — Link
    Judas Iscariot: The most reviled name in all of Sacred Scripture is judged only by his act of betrayal, but without him among the Apostles is there any Gospel at all?

20. Waking Up in the Garden of Gethsemane — Link
    The Agony in the Garden, the First Sorrowful Mystery, is a painful scene in the Passion of Christ, but in each of the Synoptic Gospels the Apostles slept through it.

21. The Apostle Falls: Simon Peter Denies Christ — Link
    The fall of Simon Peter was a scandal of Biblical proportions. His three-time denial of Jesus is recounted in every Gospel, but all is not as it first seems to be.

22. Behold the Man, as Pilate Washes His Hands — Link
    “Ecce Homo!” An 1871 painting of Christ before Pilate by Antonio Ciseri depicts a moment woven into the fabric of Salvation History, and into our very souls.

23. The Chief Priests Answered, ‘We Have No King but Caesar’ — Link
    The Passion of the Christ has historical meaning on its face, but a far deeper story lies beneath where the threads of faith and history connect to awaken the soul.

24. Simon of Cyrene Compelled to Carry the Cross - Link
    Simon of Cyrene was just a man coming in from the country to Jerusalem for the Passover when his fated path intersected the Way of the Cross and Salvation History.

25. Dismas, the Good Thief Crucified Next to Christ the King — Link
    Who was Saint Dismas, the Penitent Thief, crucified to the right of Jesus at Calvary? His brief Passion Narrative appearance has deep meaning for Salvation.

26. To the Spirits in Prison: When Jesus Descended into Hell — Link
    The Apostles Creed is the oldest statement of Catholic belief and apostolic witness. Its Fifth Article, what happened to Jesus between the Cross and the Resurrection, is a mystery to be unveiled.

27. Mary Magdalene: Faith, Courage, and an Empty Tomb — Link
    History unjustly sullied her name without evidence, but Mary Magdalene emerges from the Gospel a faithful, courageous and noble woman, an apostle to the Apostles.

28. Divine Mercy for Doubting Thomas and Other Spiritually Wounded — Link
    The Gospel on Divine Mercy Sunday is St John’s account of the spiritually wounded Thomas who would not know peace until surrendering his wounds to the Risen Christ.

29. The Holy Spirit and the Book of Ruth at Pentecost — Link
    Events at the coming of the Holy Spirit in Acts of the Apostles have roots deep in Salvation History. In the traditional Hebrew Pentecost, the Book of Ruth is read.

30. The God of the Living and the Life of the Dead — Link
    The commemoration of our beloved dead on All Souls Day has roots in ancient Christian tradition, Faith in the God of Life in the land of the living survives death.

31. To the Kingdom of Heaven through a Narrow Gate — Link
    The Gospel of St. Luke for the 21st Sunday of Ordinary Time is a summons to enter the Kingdom of God through a narrow gate, but it requires shedding some baggage.

32. Iran, by Another Name, Was Once the Savior of Israel — Link
    A story out of time for our time: The Prophet Isaiah wrote of Cyrus, King of Persia (now Iran) who knew not God but was chosen by God to restore freedom to Israel.

Overall, this collection positions Sacred Scripture as a living guide, particularly relevant amid modern resurgences in faith, encouraging readers to delve deeper into biblical exegesis for personal and communal renewal. 

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Closing Statement of Father Gordon MacRae

We will add to this collection over time. It is the real reason for which I write. Please feel free to refer back here, to bookmark it, copy the link, and share it with others if you wish. I commend Elon Musk’s advanced AI model for the sensitivity and accuracy of its treatment of this matter. This was no trivial pursuit.

God Bless you all in the New Year ahead.

Father Gordon MacRae

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Editor’s Note: To assist Father Gordon MacRae and this blog please consult our page, Contact and How to Help.

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Silent Night and the Shepherds Who Quaked at the Sight

The shepherds of our Nativity Story lived difficult lives in the social strata of the Ancient Near East, but they are summoned by angels to Bethlehem for a reason.

At Christmas

Note from Father Gordon MacRae: I first wrote this post at Christmas in 2018 but it surprisingly became one that we wanted to present anew at Christmas. It drew tens of thousands of readers from throughout the Holy Land and the Middle East and Asia. During Christmas week in 2018, 50,000 came to this post from India alone. These are historically regions where shepherds thrived. They are near the heart of the most beloved Christmas hymn of our time, Silent Night.

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“Silent Night, Holy Night,
Shepherds quake at the sight.
Glories stream from heaven afar,
Heavenly hosts sing alleluia.
Christ, the Savior is born,
Christ, the Savior is born!”

— Silent Night, Verse 2

“Silent Night,” one of our most beloved and enduring Christmas hymns, was the result of an accident. It was first heard at the Christmas Midnight Mass in the little church of Saint Nicholas in Oberdorf, Upper Austria in 1818. On Christmas Eve, the church’s organ failed. So in a pinch, the young Austrian village priest, Joseph Mohr, hastily composed some verses for a simple song while organist Franz Gruber just as hastily set them to music.

They finished just in time to sing it at Midnight Mass accompanied by the soft strumming of a guitar. The congregation was mesmerized. The untitled song became known for its first words in German, “Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht.” In 1839, a group of Austrian folk singers performed it for the first time in the United States where it was translated into English. “Silent Night, Holy Night” quickly became synonymous with Christmas. Just like the season itself, the song was written in chaos but became an enduring summons to serenity and the real meaning of Christmas.

As I began to write this post, I was mentally about as far as anyone could be from “All is calm, all is bright,” and “sleeping in heavenly peace.” It is a challenge to write an uplifting Christmas post from my current location, and an even greater challenge to write it in the aftermath of all that has gone on in the Church and the world in the last few years. It was he subject of my 2023 Christmas post, “Christmas for Those Bowed Down by the Fatigue of This World.”

On the Birth of the Messiah

There was a lot of controversy that Christmas about the removal of faithful shepherds whom many of us have come to know and admire. This has happened while apparently less than stellar shepherds have been elevated before our eyes. This Christmas, the controversy has continued with the suppresion of the Traditional Latin Mass through which many devout Catholics have found comfort and joy. To be a shepherd was once a difficult life that has become a vocation. There is a lot of attention on the qualities of the Church’s shepherds right now. Let’s go back to the beginning.

Accounts of the infancy and childhood of Jesus appear in only two of the canonical Gospels: Matthew (1:18 – 2:23) and Luke (1:5 – 2:52). The two accounts have only the most basic elements of the story in common: Mary’s virginal conception, and the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem. I once wrote of how that came about, and how Bethlehem came to be called in Scripture the “City of David.” That post was “The Holy Spirit and the Book of Ruth at Pentecost.”

The Gospel of Matthew alone contains the story of the Magi, the threat posed by Herod, and the Flight of the Holy Family into Egypt. The Gospel of Luke alone has the Angel of the Lord summoning shepherds to witness the newborn King.

Some scholars propose that the Gospel’s Infancy Narratives were added later and were of little interest to the early Church. I take the opposite view. Other accounts in the Apocryphal (meaning “hidden”) Gospels arose out of the first two centuries of the Church. They are not included in the canon of inspired Scripture, but they reveal the Early Church’s fascination with the Birth and childhood of Jesus. Their stories were sometimes embellished, but traditions from the earliest times of the Church cling to some of their accounts.

The Apocryphal Gospel of James, preserved in Greek from no later than the early Second Century, is the sole source of the names of Mary’s parents, Joachim and Anna. It is also the only source of the story of the Presentation of Mary in the Temple, and a more detailed account of the fears of suspicion about her pregnancy.

The Arabic Gospel of the Infancy, of unknown origin, is a later compilation of earlier oral traditions none of which can be measured against history. It has an expanded account of the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt from the Gospel of Matthew. It also presents a story only vaguely recalled about the Holy Family’s encounter in the desert with Dismas and Gestas, the names given by Tradition to the two criminals who were later crucified with Jesus. It is a story I included in “Dismas, the Good Thief Crucified Next to Christ the King,”

The History of Joseph the Carpenter, of Egyptian origin in the first few centuries, AD, contains stories of the life of Joseph which are not reflected in any of the Gospel narratives. They include an expanded account of the Flight into Egypt and a popular story about his soul being removed by an angel at the time of his death in the presence of Jesus and Mary. These sources and others reflect the popular interest of early Christians with the Birth of the Messiah and the legitimacy of the accounts that found their way into the Gospels of Matthew and Luke writing from two different traditions. In the Gospel of Luke, for example, it has long been believed that Luke’s source for the story of the Birth of the Messiah was Mary herself.

Moses [when he was a shepherd] Defends Jethro’s Daughters by James Jacques Joseph Tissot. Courtesy of Jewish Museum.

The Biblical Shepherds

Sheep herding was a profession of the common man — or woman — in the ancient world. For the most orthodox Jews in the time of Jesus, it was a position with low social rank and often disdained. It has always plagued the faithful that some religious leaders can become oblivious to the tenets of their own faith. Shepherds were looked down upon even as God Himself was seen as the Shepherd of Israel (Genesis 49:24 and Psalm 80:1). The most popular Scriptural identification of God as shepherd is in Psalm 23:

“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. In verdant pastures He gives me repose. Beside restful waters He leads me. He restores my soul.”

— Ps. 23: 1-2

There are 123 references to shepherds in Sacred Scripture, beginning with one of the most ancient accounts, the story of Cain and Abel in Genesis (Chapter 4). Scripture depicts an age-old tension between shepherds and those who till the land. Each regarded the other as antagonistic to his interests. Clearing land for farming in the Ancient Near East meant that shepherds had to travel far and wide to find land suitable for grazing. In contrast, the pasturing of flocks damaged both land and crops.

With severe limits in both land and water, this forced shepherds into a nomadic life, and an economic rivalry with agriculture. Sheep had to be led from pasture to pasture as changing seasons required migration over vast distances. Shepherds had to find not only suitable and available grazing, but a water supply. Shepherds had to shelter their flocks in inclement weather and protect them from wild beasts and disgruntled farmers. Scripture is filled with wolf and sheep allegories.

The Prophet Amos was a shepherd, but some Prophetic voices present some shepherds as “unfaithful” (Ezekiel 34:2-10), as “simple-minded” (Jeremiah 10:21), as letting their flocks scatter:

“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the flock of my pasture—oracle of the LORD.

Therefore, thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, against the shepherds who shepherd my people: You have scattered my sheep and driven them away. You have not cared for them, but I will take care to punish your evil deeds.”

—Jeremiah 23:1-2

The Scriptural references continue portraying some shepherds: as “leading people astray” (Jeremiah 50:6), as “lacking in grace or understanding” (Isaiah 56:11ff). In our time, some of our most outstanding shepherds are themselves left to wander.

Despite the fact that shepherds were socially frowned upon, God showed favor to many shepherds throughout Scripture, calling them to heroic and pivotal missions. The story of Cain and Abel in Genesis (4:2 and following) has Cain tilling the earth while Abel is a sheepherder, aka, shepherd. When it came time to offer their gifts in sacrifice, Abel’s gift was found to be more pleasing to God resulting in humanity’s first homicide. Many generations later, Jacob, grandson of Abraham, described in a plea to Laban his life as a shepherd:

“It was like this with me: by day the heat consumed me, and the cold by night, and my sheep fled from my eyes.”

— Genesis 31:40

Joseph, the Joseph who was the main focus of Genesis chapters 37 to 50, was the youngest of his brothers and a shepherd. Jealous of their father’s favoritism toward him, his brothers sold him to slave traders who took him to Egypt. He later assured their salvation, saving their lives in a time of famine in Israel.

In Egypt, Jews came to be identified as nomadic shepherds and shepherding came to be seen by the Egyptians as an abominable life (Genesis 43:32). Moses, called by God to receive the Covenant, was first a shepherd. Saint Luke’s account of the shepherds called to Bethlehem has an echo of Moses’ encounter with God on Mount Sinai as he received the Commandments:

“And in that region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an Angel of the Lord appeared to them and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear”

— Luke 2:8-9

Adoration of the Shepherds by Bartolome Esteban Murillo. Courtesy of Museo del Prado.

Come to Bethlehem

Many generations later still after Moses, David, a shepherd, boasted of having killed lions with his bare hands when they attacked his father’s flocks. The Birth narrative in the Gospel of Luke also has an echo of King David’s humble origin as a shepherd (1 Samuel 16:1-23). St Luke presents an image of the call of the Shepherds by an Angel of the Lord as being privileged with a vision of King David’s successor. It is presented in language highly reminiscent of a king descended from David:

“Be not afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will come to all the people; for to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you. You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. Then suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly hosts saying, ‘Glory to God in the Highest, and on Earth peace to men with whom he is pleased.”’

— Luke 2:10-14

As mentioned above, elements of Saint Luke’s Gospel account suggest that Mary was herself the source of this information. When the shepherds came to Bethlehem that night and found her with Joseph and the Christ-child just as the angel had said, Mary heard the account of their encounter with the angels and the heavenly hosts in the darkness. When the New Testament speaks of darkness, we cannot really imagine it. With the total absence of any artificial light, their darkness was dark indeed. “But Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:19).

The Christmas Proclamation traditionally proclaimed from the Roman Martyrology on the Vigil of Christmas begins with creation and connects the birth of the Lord with the major events of both sacred and secular history. The Proclamation reveals something of crucial importance for our time.

Abraham, our Father in Faith, came out of Ur of the Chaldees to encounter God who forged a covenant with Him in the 21st Century before the Birth of Christ. We now live in the 21st Century after. This places Christ the King at the very center of Salvation History from our perspective. It is no mystery that the time in which we live now is so tumultuous, with Earthly Powers vying with Heaven for the souls of humankind. Christ now stands equidistant in time between God’s covenant with Abraham and our present.

We must come to understand the cosmic importance of the time in which we live and the battle for souls being waged here. We must hope and pray that the shepherds of our time come to understand that as well, and live — not just speak, but live — faithfully and courageously, the Gospel we profess.

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The Roman Martyrology Proclamation of the Birth of Christ:

The twenty-fifth day of December when ages beyond number had run their course from the creation of the world, when God in the beginning created the heavens and earth, and formed man in His own likeness; when century upon century had passed since the Almighty set his bow in the clouds after the Great Flood, as a sign of covenant and peace — In the twenty-first century since Abraham, our father in faith, came out of Ur of the Chaldees; in the thirteenth century since the people of Israel were led by Moses in the Exodus from Egypt; in the tenth century since David was anointed King; in the sixty-fifth week of the prophecy of Daniel; in the one hundred and ninety-fourth Olympiad; in the year seven hundred and fifty-two since the founding of Rome; in the forty-second year in the reign of Caesar Octavian Augustus, the whole world being at peace — Jesus Christ, eternal God and Son of the eternal Father, desiring to consecrate the world by his most loving presence, was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and when nine months had passed since His conception, was born of the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem of Judah, and was made man.

— The Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ according to the flesh

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: There are plenty of voices in this secular culture trying to suppress the real meaning of Christmas. Please share this post with others. If you are alone at Christmas, or know anyone who is, you and they are invited to spend some time with us. The first of our links below is our annual Christmas post filled with music, videos, and the Christmas Proclamation. We also invite you to Saint Maximilian Kolbe’s Eucharistic Adoration Chapel linked below.

Christmas for Those Bowed Down by the Fatigue of this World

Joseph’s Dream and the Birth of the Messiah

Upon a Midnight Not so Clear, Some Wise Men from the East Appear

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The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Of Saints and Souls and Earthly Woes

For Catholics, the month of November honors our beloved dead, and is a time to reinforce our civil liberties especially the one most endangered: Religious Freedom.

The Commemoration of All Saints and All Souls by Fr. Gordon MacRae

A lot of attention has been paid to a recent post by Pornchai Moontri. Writing in my stead from Thailand, his post was “Elephants and Men and Tragedy in Thailand.” Many readers were able to put a terrible tragedy into spiritual perspective. Writer Dorothy R. Stein commented on it: “The Kingdom of Thailand weeps for its children. Only a wounded healer like Mr. Pornchai Moontri could tell such a devastating story and yet leave readers feeling inspired and hopeful. This is indeed a gift. I have read many accounts of this tragedy, but none told with such elegant grace.”

A few years ago I wrote of the sting of death, and the story of how one particular friend’s tragic death stung very deeply. But there is far more to the death of loved ones than its sting. A decade ago at this time I wrote a post that helped some readers explore a dimension of death they had not considered. It focused not only on the sense of loss that accompanies the deaths of those we love, but also on the link we still share with them. It gave meaning to that “Holy Longing” that extends beyond death — for them and for us — and suggested a way to live in a continuity of relationship with those who have died. The All Souls Day Commemoration in the Roman Missal also describes this relationship:

“The Church, after celebrating the Feast of All Saints, prays for all who in the purifying suffering of purgatory await the day when they will join in their company. The celebration of the Mass, which re-enacts the sacrifice of Calvary, has always been the principal means by which the Church fulfills the great commandment of charity toward the dead. Even after death, our relationship with our beloved dead is not broken.”

That waiting, and our sometimes excruciatingly painful experience of loss, is “The Holy Longing.” The people we have loved and lost are not really lost. They are still our family, our friends, and our fellow travelers, and we shouldn’t travel with them in silence. The month of November is a time to restore our spiritual connection with departed loved ones. If you know others who have suffered the deaths of family and friends, please share with them a link to “The Holy Longing: An All Souls Day Spark for Broken Hearts.”

The Communion of Saints

I have written many times about the saints who inspire us on this arduous path. The posts that come most immediately to mind are “A Tale of Two Priests: Maximilian Kolbe and John Paul II,” and more recently, “With Padre Pio When the Worst that Could Happen Happens.” Saint Maximilian Kolbe and Saint Padre Pio inspire me not because I have so much in common with them, but because I have so little. I am not at all like them, but I came to know them because I was drawn to the ways they faced and coped with adversity in their lives on Earth.

Patron saints really are advocates in Heaven, but the story is bigger than that. To have patron saints means something deeper than just hoping to share in the graces for which they suffered. It means to be in a relationship with them as role models for our inevitable encounter with human trials and suffering. They can advocate not only for us, but for the souls of those we entrust to their intercession. In the Presence of God, they are more like a lens for us, and not dispensers of grace in their own right. The Protestant critique that Catholics “pray to saints” has it all wrong.

To be in a relationship with patron saints means much more than just waiting for their help in times of need. I have learned a few humbling things this year about the dynamics of a relationship with Saints Maximilian Kolbe and Padre Pio. I have tried to consciously cope with painful things the way they did, and over time they opened my eyes about what it means to have their advocacy. It is an advocacy I would not need if I were even remotely like them. It is an advocacy I need very much, and can no longer live without.

I don’t think we choose the saints who will be our patrons and advocates in Heaven. I think they choose us. In ways both subtle and profound, they interject their presence in our lives. I came into my unjust imprisonment decades ago knowing little to nothing of Saints Maximilian Kolbe and Padre Pio. But in multiple posts at Beyond These Stone Walls I have written of how they made their presence here known. And in that process, I have learned a lot about why they’re now in my life. It is not because they look upon me and see their own paths. It is because they look upon me and see how much and how easily I stray from their paths.

I recently discovered something about the intervention of these saints that is at the same time humbling and deeply consoling. It is consoling because it affirms for me that these modern saints have made themselves a part of what I must bear each day. It is humbling because that fact requires shedding all my notions that their intercession means a rescue from the crosses I would just as soon not carry.

Over the last few years, I have had to live with something that is very painful — physically very painful — and sometimes so intensely so that I could focus on little else. In prison, there are not many ways to escape from pain. I can purchase some over-the-counter ibuprophen in the prison commissary, but that’ is sort of like fighting a raging forest fire with bottled water. It is not very effective. At times, the relentless pain flared up and got the better of me, and I became depressed. There are not many ways to escape depression in prison either. The combination of nagging pain and depression began to interfere with everything I was doing, and others started to notice. The daily barrage of foul language and constantly loud prison noise that I have heard non-stop for decades suddenly had the effect of a rough rasp being dragged across the surface of my brain. Many of you know exactly what I mean.

So one night, I asked Saint Padre Pio to intercede that I might be delivered from this awful nagging pain. I fell off to sleep actually feeling a little hopeful, but it was not to be. The next morning I awoke to discover my cross of pain even heavier than the night before. Then suddenly I became aware that I had just asked Padre Pio — a soul who in life bore the penetrating pain of the wounds of Christ without relief for fifty years — to nudge the Lord to free me from my pain. What was I thinking?! That awareness was a spiritually more humbling moment than any physical pain I have ever had to bear.

So for now, at least, I will live with this pain, and even embrace it, but I am no longer depressed about it. Situational depression, I have learned, comes when you expect an outcome other than the one you have. I no longer expect Padre Pio to rescue me from my pain, so I am no longer depressed. I now see that my relationship with him is not going to be based upon being pain-free. It is going to be what it was initially, and what I had allowed to lapse. It is the example of how he coped with suffering by turning himself over to grace, and by making an offering of what he suffered.

A rescue would sure be nice, but his example is, in the long run, a lot more effective. I know myself. If I awake tomorrow and this pain is gone forever, I will thank Saint Padre Pio. Then just as soon as my next cross comes my way — as I once described in “A Shower of Roses” — I will begin to doubt that the saint had anything to do with my release.

His example, on the other hand, is something I can learn from, and emulate. The truth is that few, if any, of the saints we revere were themselves rescued from what they suffered and endured in this life. We do not seek their intercession because they were rescued. We seek their intercession because they bore all for Christ. They bore their own suffering as though it were a shield of honor and they are going to show us how we can bear our own.

For Greater Glory

Back in 2010 when my friend Pornchai Moontri was preparing to be received into the Church, he asked one of his “upside down” questions. I called them “upside down” questions because as I lay in the bunk in our prison cell reading late at night, his head would pop down from the upper bunk so he appeared upside down to me as he asked a question. “When people pray to saints do they really expect a miracle?” I asked for an example, and he said, “Should you or I ask Saint Maximilian Kolbe for a happy ending when he didn’t have one himself?”

I wonder if Pornchai knew how incredibly irritating it was when he stumbled spontaneously upon a spiritual truth that I had spent months working out in my own soul. Pornchai’s insight was true, but an inconvenient truth — inconvenient by Earthly hopes, anyway. The truth about Auschwitz, and even a very long prison sentence, was that all hope for rescue was the first hope to die among any of its occupants. As Maximilian Kolbe lay in that Auschwitz bunker chained to, but outliving, his fellow prisoners being slowly starved to death, did he expect to be rescued?

All available evidence says otherwise. Father Maximilian Kolbe led his fellow sufferers into and through a death that robbed their Nazi persecutors of the power and meaning they intended for that obscene gesture. How ironic would it be for me to now place my hope for rescue from an unjust and uncomfortable imprisonment at the feet of Saint Maximilian Kolbe? Just having such an expectation is more humiliating than prison itself. Devotion to Saint Maximilian Kolbe helped us face prison bravely. It does not deliver us from prison walls, but rather from their power to stifle our souls.

I know exactly what brought about Pornchai’s question. Each weekend when there were no programs and few activities in prison, DVD films were broadcast on a closed circuit in-house television channel. Thanks to a reader, a DVD of the soul-stirring film, “For Greater Glory” was donated to the prison. That evening we were able to watch the great film. It was an hour or two after viewing this film that Pornchai asked his “upside-down” question.

“For Greater Glory” is one of the most stunning and compelling films of recent decades. You must not miss it. It is the historically accurate story of the Cristero War in Mexico in 1926. Academy Award nominee Andy Garcia portrays General Enrique Gorostieta Delarde in a riveting performance as the leader of Mexico’s citizen rebellion against the efforts of a socialist regime to diminish and then eradicate religious liberty and public expressions of Christianity, especially Catholic faith.

If you have not seen “For Greater Glory,” I urge you to do so. Its message is especially important before drawing any conclusions about the importance of the issue of religious liberty now facing Americans and all of Western Culture. As readers in the United States know well, in 2026 we face a most important election for the future direction of Congress and the Senate.

“For Greater Glory” is an entirely true account, and portrays well the slippery slope from a government that tramples upon religious freedom to the actual persecution, suppression and cancelation of priests and expressions of Catholic faith and witness. If you think it could not happen here, think again. It could not happen in Mexico either, but it did. We may not see our priests publicly executed, but we are already seeing them in prison without due process, and even silenced by their own bishops, sometimes just for boldly speaking the truth of the Gospel. You have seen the practice of your faith diminished as “non-essential” by government dictate during a pandemic.

The real star of this film — and I warn you, it will break your heart — is the heroic soul of young José Luis Sánchez del Río, a teen whose commitment to Christ and his faith resulted in horrible torment and torture. If this film were solely the creation of Hollywood, there would have been a happy ending. José would have been rescued to live happily ever after. It is not Hollywood, however; it is real. José’s final tortured scream of “Viva Cristo Rey!” is something I will remember forever.

I cried, finally, at the end as I read in the film’s postscript that José Luis Sánchez del Río was beatified as a martyr by Pope Benedict XVI after his elevation to the papacy in 2005. Saint José was canonized October 16, 2016 by Pope Francis, a new Patron Saint of Religious Liberty. His Feast Day is February 10. José’s final “Viva Cristo Rey!” echoes across the century, across all of North America, across the globe, to empower a quest for freedom that can be found only where young José found it.

“Viva Cristo Rey!”

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Note from Fr. Gordon MacRae: Our Faith is a matter of life and death, and it diminishes to our spiritual peril. Please share this post. You may also like these related posts to honor our beloved dead in the month of November.

Elephants and Men and Tragedy in Thailand

The Holy Longing: An All Souls Day Spark for Broken Hearts

The God of the Living and the Life of the Dead

A Not-so-Subtle Wake-Up Call from Christ the King

Illumination from Down Under: Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast

A well researched book by Fr. James Valladares casts light on the case of Fr. Gordon MacRae and the state of due process for Catholic priests falsely accused. 

October 8, 2025 by Father Gordon MacRae

Abraham Lincoln once told a story about a man who traveled along a backwoods road on a dark and stormy night. After several claps of earth-shaking thunder in the blackness, with just the occasional flash of lightning to show him he was still on his path, the man issued a plea: “Lord, if it’s all the same to Thee, a little less noise and a little more light, please.”

I have been making that very same plea for over three decade now. It resonates clearly in my post, “When Priests Are Falsely Accused: The Mirror of Justice Cracked” and other more recent posts such as, “Unjustly in Prison for 30 Years: A Collision of Fury and Faith.” Those two posts are separated by twenty years, and their litany of woe has not evolved so much. When I wrote back in 2010, I felt very much alone on that dark and noisy path hoping that someone might come along with some light amid all the hype.

The sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic priesthood has generated so much pointless, noisy emotional rhetoric that light has become a precious and rare commodity. The “zero tolerance” policy of the U.S. Bishops’ panic-driven 2002 Dallas Charter added no light at all, but only turned up the volume on corrupt voices like the ones I described in “David Clohessy Resigned SNAP in Alleged Kickback Scheme.” In these decades of scandal, many Catholics have been duped. The crisis has been used by some very noisy people to silence a Catholic voice in the public square. And there are still no shortage of voices trying to silence Catholic justice in the public square.

In all times of moral panic, however, no amount of noise will dissuade a few courageous voices from the truth, no matter how much that truth is suppressed. One of these voices to emerge with full and reasoned Catholic courage is David F. Pierre, Jr., publisher of TheMediaReport.com and author of several landmark books including Catholic Priests Falsely Accussed: The Facts, The Fraud, The Stories.” We profiled this and several other of David Pierre’s work and his exposure of corruption in coverage of the Catholic scandal in “Hidden Evil: The Anti-Catholic Agenda of BishopAccountability.org.”

There is another, and his voice of priestly courage and fidelity rose up on the opposite side of the world in Australia, a land not unfamiliar to scapegoating a falsely accused and wrongly imprisoned priest, this time in the person of the late Cardinal George Pell. Father James Valladares, a priest, psychologist and noted author in Australia, published the compelling book, Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast (iUniverse 2012). Catholics concerned about the downward spiral of justice and public discourse in the Catholic Church would do well to read this book. (Twelve years after its first publication it is available as an e-book for $3.99, less than the price of a BigMac, and much more nourishing.) I recommend it for priests, bishops, and all Catholics who have felt demoralized by the contentious and confrontational tone constantly aimed at the Church and priesthood in the last three decades. I received my copy some years ago, and have recently been re-reading it for the moral and spiritual boost it brings. I was stunned by this courageous book.

Before I describe it further, however, we need some full disclosure. I am in this book. In fact, I am in this book extensively, and so is Beyond These Stone Walls. I find it very difficult to write about a book that I am in. Father James Valladares did his homework, and he did it well. His book exposes aspects of my story that made me tremble. I read it through two consecutive sleepless nights that left me spiritually and emotionally propelled in my priesthood, even in unjust imprisonment. It helped me to understand that I did not become a priest 43 years ago just to start thinking of myself when the world fell under my feet. It was not because the author framed my case as a justice crisis for the courts, but rather as a greater and more crucial justice crisis for the Church.

Father Valladares is the very first writer to accomplish this nebulous task, and he did it with amazing clarity and courage. In the end, I am not certain whether it should encourage me or frighten me. Not even I — after living in this nightmare for three decades — had a full understanding of the implications for the Church and priesthood that Father Valladares laid out so masterfully.

In Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast, Father James Valladares has excised these wounds upon the Church and priesthood with impeccable credentials in developmental, educational, and counseling psychology. Having served as a lecturer in psychology at Saint Andrew’s College in Mumbai, India, he has completed extensive post-doctoral research in religion, healing, and parenting. Father Valladares serves in the Archdiocese of Adelaide, Australia.

Channeling Father Neuhaus and Cardinal Dulles

As I have written many times before, I am no strong believer in random coincidence. I picked up for the second time Hope Springs Eternal on May 14, the Feast of Saint Matthias, the man chosen by the Apostles to replace Judas, the Betrayer (Acts 1:26). I also was aware that May 14 was the birthday of my late great good friend Father Richard John Neuhaus, one of the inspirations behind Beyond These Stone Walls and forever remembered as a priest who served the Catholic Church in North America with exceptional light, clarity and fidelity. Another is Cardinal Avery Dulles, to whom I owe the idea of Beyond These Stone Walls’ existence. Both are cited and quoted repeatedly by Father James Valladares in Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast.

I had been reviewing excerpts of Father Neuhaus’ prophetic collection of essays, “Scandal Time,” about the priesthood crisis published in First Things magazine. On May 14, I had been reading an essay by Fr. Neuhaus entitled “In the Aftermath of Scandal,” (First Things, February 2004). When I opened Father Valladares’ book I spotted the excerpt from the same essay:

“The niceties of Canon Law, due process, and elementary decency have in many instances taken a beating. As one cardinal archbishop said after Dallas (2002), it may be necessary for some priests to suffer injustice for the good of the Church. In the course of history, Caiaphas has not been without his defenders.”

— Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast, p.25

Some readers might find it odd that I agree, at least in part, with that unnamed cardinal quoted by Father Neuhaus. It has always been necessary for some to suffer for the good of the Church. I hope that was clear in Pornchai Moontri’s prophetic post, “On the Day of Padre Pio, My Best Friend Was Stigmatized.”

My greatest suffering is not wrongful imprisonment, however, as horrible as that actually is. I hope readers know by now that I have not been languishing in prison beating my own priestly breast in a litany of woe for thirty-one years. My far greater suffering is that the Dallas Charter considers prison, even to be wrongfully imprisoned, to be the end of priesthood forever. Any Church bureaucrat who thinks that prison by its very nature marks the end of my priesthood seriously underestimates both me and priesthood. No consistent reader of Beyond These Stone Walls could ever draw such a flawed conclusion.

Father James Valladares most certainly has not drawn that conclusion. After reading his book, I was in awe of the extent to which he has been listening to me from the far side of the world through his reading of Beyond These Stone Walls. I cannot speak for him, but I think I can safely write that he has not listened to me because I am a priest or because I am a prisoner. He has listened to me because, to date at least, I remain both. I face every day as both. If I was not a priest in these extraordinary circumstances, not much of what I have had to say would have landed in this, or any, book.

So why would I conclude that at the time of my ordination in 1982, if I knew then what I know now, I would still be ordained a priest? We are a Church built upon the blood of the martyrs. To conclude today that their lives should never have been lost to bloodshed, and that their suffering has no meaning, is to discard the meaning of the very foundations of the Church, and even the Cross of Christ.

On the day I offered my First Mass, on June 6, 1982, I remember standing at the altar with great joy and profound peace surrounded by hundreds of my friends and brother priests who came to celebrate that First Mass with me. If elevating the Body of Christ for the very first time would have given me a glimpse of where priesthood would have me more than forty years in the future, would I have ever dared to elevate that Host again? I have to answer not with a resounding “yes,” but with a sacrificial one, and for the very reasons Father Valladares describes:

“In June of 2002, during the height of the media’s focus on Catholic bishops and priests, the Los Angeles Times [no friend of the priesthood] sent surveys to 5,000 priests in the United States . . . The survey found that 91 percent of respondents were satisfied with their life as a priest; 90 percent of respondents would choose to be a priest again if they had the opportunity; and 91 percent of respondents thought it was unlikely that they would ever leave the priesthood.”

— Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast, p.97

It was upon reading this that I understood why Father Valladares would dare to name his book about facing and cleansing the darkest wounds of the Church and Priesthood, Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast. It is because it does. In spite of all the noise and name calling, in spite of all the challenges and chastisement, in spite of all the suffering and sacrifice, priesthood in the Catholic Church is like that famous image of a flower forcing its way through cracks in the urban concrete to reach the light of day. Priesthood, if centered on sacrifice, will survive all that is thrown at it.

You will not read about this in The New York Times or the National Catholic Distorter – umm, Reporter. You will not read about this at the toxic landfill websites of SNAP or Bishop Accountability. Writer, Ryan A. MacDonald made this clear in his essay, “Why Did SNAP and VOTF Fear the Case of Father Gordon MacRae?” The toxic sites of SNAP and Bishop Accountability exist to promote agendas that have nothing to do with protecting children or serving the Church. They exist to restore the dissent of 1968, the year we drank from the poison of this world.

The wounds of the priesthood must be healed, but they cannot be healed as long as only one side of the story is told. It is a fact that vulnerable people were once harmed at the hands of a small number of Catholic priests several decades ago. It is a fact that child sexual abuse in our society was and still is a reality of epidemic proportions. It is also a fact that scapegoating the Catholic Church does little to cast light on this topic and does nothing — absolutely nothing — to protect children in our broken and narcissistic culture.

It is also a fact that many Catholic priests have been falsely accused despite the unfounded and poorly informed rhetoric of commentators such as Monsignor Stephen Rossetti. The former Director of Saint Luke Institute spoke at a symposium for Vatican officials tasked with exploring the truth. They were not well served by his uncorroborated claim that in his experience, false accusations against priests are very rare. From my experience, and that of David F. Pierre, Jr. at TheMediaReport.com, false allegations thrive and proliferate in direct proportion to the unquestioned money thrown at them by Church insurers and scandal-weary bishops. To date, the extorted settlements have exceeded $5 Billion nationwide.

Msgr. Rossetti’s baseless assertion may have been true in 1980. It is not true today. He would do well to spend some time at the Innocence Project website to examine the stories of hundreds of men exonerated after being wrongfully imprisoned for decades falsely accused of sexual assault. I can only respond to Monsignor Rossetti with something quoted in Father James Valladares’ book:

“Justice has turned on its head when men who stand to gain hundreds 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.’”

— Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast, p. 207

At the Turning of the Tide

Over recent years, some prophetic and courageous voices have emerged in the Catholic public square to stem the tide of unjust vilification of the priesthood. Let’s hope these voices reverberate throughout this time of crisis and conflicting agendas to inspire others.  Father Michael P. Orsi, while Research Director of Ave Maria University School of Law, wrote “Bogus Charges Against Priests Abound.” So has David F. Pierre, host of The Media Report, with his “Bombshell Report” about false accusations and his “Alarming New Exclusive Report” about new evidence in my own case.

These writers of just and merciful Catholic conscience have made me proud to be a priest, and have given meaning to the suffering inherent in 31 years of wrongful imprisonment. Our reluctant Catholic press would do well to put aside its “Father Maciel Syndrome,” and follow their lead to cover this story.

In “The Prisoner-Priest Behind These Stone Walls,” Ryan A. MacDonald described Beyond These Stone Walls as “the finest example of priestly witness the last decades of scandal have produced.” If you are reading these pages you have lent to your Church and faith a courageous ear, and the tools for spreading the rest of the story. If you have been reading this story then you have demonstrated for me and the whole Body of Christ something that has been sorely lacking in this decades of scandal: hearts of courage and justice open to the whole truth, and not just the one-sided scarlet letter with which our scandal-driven news media and special interest groups have labeled your Church. Fr. James Valladares and David F. Pierre, Jr. have told the rest of the story.

I believe it is told here as well, but spreading the truth relies not just on their courage, but on yours. I have no doubt that you have such courage for I have seen it. Help us tell the rest of the story by sharing this post in the Catholic online world, among your social networking, and by sharing a link.

In his Foreword to Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast, Father Michael P. Orsi wrote:

“The present scenario reported by Fr. Valladares is dark. Yet, he has surprisingly chosen a title for his book that speaks of hope. For sure, it is a hope based on Jesus’ words to his disciples, ‘I will be with you always.’ Therefore, far from being pessimistic, Fr. Valladares presents the facts with confidence that ‘the truth will set us free.’ For his hard work, born out of a love for the priesthood and his brother priests, Fr. [James] Valladares is to be commended.”

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AI Overview of “Illumination from Down Under: Hope Springs Eternal in the Priestly Breast”

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Thank you for reading and sharing this post. Don’t stop here. You might also like these related posts from Beyond These Stone Walls:

Fr Gordon MacRae in the Prison Journal of George Cardinal Pell

Unjustly in Prison for 30 Years: A Collision of Fury and Faith

Hidden Evil: The Anti-Catholic Agenda of BishopAccountability.org

On the Day of Padre Pio My Best Friend Was Stigmatized

About Beyond These Stone Walls

This fine book by Father Valladares is available at Amazon and Barnes and Noble as an e-book for $3.99, and at Amazon as softcover for $21.34.

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”

Iran, by Another Name, Was Once the Savior of Israel

A story out of time for our time: The Prophet Isaiah wrote of Cyrus, King of Persia (now Iran) who knew not God but was chosen by God to restore freedom to Israel.

June 25, 2025 by Father Gordon MacRae

It is hard for me to NOT write about some developments especially when they fall within the realm of human rights and religious freedom. If I fail to address what seems to engulf the attention of entire nations, then I feel as though I am overlooking the elephant in the sacristy. The world was riveted to events in Iran, Israel, and the United States on Saturday, June 21, 2025. There is a backstory that rises up out of ancient times in the same place where nuclear Armageddon was possibly prevented on that day.

This post is about Cyrus the Great, the Sixth Century BC conqueror and King of the Persian Empire in what is now modern day Iran. King Cyrus is the subject of a reading from the Prophet Isaiah (45:1):

“Thus says the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have grasped to subdue nations before him and ungird the loins of kings, to open doors before him that gates may not be closed.”

Read on, please, because this Cyrus, pulled from the pages of Biblical history as the ancestor of contemporary Iran, was once the salvation of Israel.

In Defense of Jerusalem

“Thus says the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have grasped, subduing nations before him, and making kings run in his service, opening doors before him, and leaving the gates unbarred: For the sake of Jacob, my servant, of Israel, my chosen one, I have called you by your name, giving you a title, though you knew me not. I am the Lord and there is no other; there is no God besides me. It is I who arm you, though you know me not, so that toward the rising and the setting of the sun people may know that there is none besides me. I am the Lord. There is no other.”

— Isaiah 45:1, 4-6

There is little known of the Prophet Isaiah except that he lived in Jerusalem and his prophetic activity extended from about 740 BC to 701 BC, a period of about forty years. In the passage above, the Lord, through Isaiah, is addressing a man named Cyrus who is called by God and given power and a title, “though you knew me not.” The power and authority given to Cyrus is not for Cyrus, but rather so that “the people may know that there is none besides me. I am the Lord.”

Two centuries after the prophesies of Isaiah, in 597 BC, Israel fell under the armies of Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II. This account, told in the Second Book of Kings (Ch. 24ff) resulted in two waves of exile of the Jews into Babylon. In the first wave, in 597 BC, Israel’s leaders were compromised and taken away. This undermining of the leaders was for the purpose of destroying the religious identity of the people. Then, in 586 BC, the real devastation came. Babylon destroyed the Temple and the entire city of Jerusalem, and sent the remaining Jews into exile.

Then, some two centuries after first appearing in the prophecy of Isaiah, God took the right hand of a man named Cyrus, who knew not God, and subdued nations before him, placed kings in his service, opened doors and unbarred gates just as predicted. Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon and all its surrounding regions to become first King of the Persian Empire — which again includes present-day Iran. Cyrus did not live a lifestyle that the People of God had any reason to respect. He did not appear to believe in anything but himself.

But Cyrus had one quirky trait that seemed to have been instilled in him by a much Higher Authority. Despite his personally sinful lifestyle and quest for Earthly powers, Cyrus developed a deep respect for the Jews and their Faith, even though he personally shared in none of it. The Lord God had groomed him, knocked down kingdoms before him, so Cyrus did what only the Emperor of the Persian Empire could do. He issued an edict ordering the reconstruction of the city of Jerusalem and its Temple, and he returned the Chosen People from their fifty-year exile in 539 BC to the land of Israel earning him an honored place in Judaism and Salvation History as Israel’s Redeemer.

The Prophet Ezra and the Decree of Cyrus

The Prophet Isaiah presents Cyrus as appearing in about 545 BC as the hope for Jerusalem. He is bestowed by Isaiah with a rather lofty title, “the anointed of Yahweh.” Such a title marked the beginning of the Age of Messianic Prophecy for Israel. The title would have been seen as a great insult to the Jews, but in forced exile they came to view Cyrus for his present actions and not his past pursuits. Isaiah (44:28) expanded his title to “Shepherd of Israel,” in recognition of the strangest trait that was found in him: his almost obsessive insistence on the promotion of religious liberty and the establishment of laws that will guarantee and protect it for the Jewish People and for Israel.

In regard to the restoration of Israel, this hope was fulfilled in 538 BC when Cyrus ordered the protection of the Jews and their return to Jerusalem to oversee the rebuilding of their Temple from the treasury of the Persian Empire. The full text of the Decree of Cyrus appears in the Book of the Prophet Ezra (6:3-5), a passage once doubted for its authenticity but now accepted as authentic by modern Scripture scholars:

“In the first year of Cyrus the King, a decree concerning the House of God in Jerusalem: Let the House be rebuilt, the place where sacrifices are offered and burnt offerings are brought. Its height shall be sixty cubits and its breadth sixty cubits with three courses of great stone and one course of timber. Let the cost be paid from the royal treasury. And also let the gold and silver vessels of the House of God, which Nebuchadnezzar took out of the Temple and brought to Babylon, be restored to Israel and returned to the Temple in Jerusalem, each to its place in the House of God.”

— Ezra 6:3-5

The Prophet Ezra went on to describe that some of the restoration of Jerusalem was interrupted by local vassal kings who did not believe that the conquering tyrant, Cyrus, would issue such an order. A complaint was made by a local governor to Darius I, King of Hystaspis, that the Jews were rebuilding the city. Darius then found an authenticated copy of the Decree of Cyrus, and ordered that the Temple and reconstruction of the city will be continued with no further hindrance. This was the same King Darius, by the way, who threw Daniel in the lions’ den (Daniel 6:6ff).

Is there a point of understanding to be considered from all this in our present time? Only you can arrive at such a conclusion. I have already arrived at mine, and I must come down on the side of religious liberty and those, some of whom knew not God, who are nonetheless chosen and set in place to bring it about for those in Covenant with God.

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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Thank you for reading and sharing this post, which strives to bring context out of the past and into the present for a story that is consuming our news. In the Seventh Century AD, some 1,200 years after the events described in this post, Arabs brought Islam to the Middle East and it spread.

You might also like these related posts out of history:

Behold the Lamb of God Upon the Altar of Mount Moriah

Qumran: The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Coming Apocalypse

Left in Afghanistan: Taliban, al Qaeda, ISIS-K, Credibility

On Good Authority, “Salvation Is from the Jews”

The Eucharistic Adoration Chapel established by Saint Maximilian Kolbe was inaugurated at the outbreak of World War II. It was restored as a Chapel of Adoration in September, 2018, the commemoration of the date that the war began. It is now part of the World Center of Prayer for Peace. The live internet feed of the Adoration Chapel at Niepokalanow — sponsored by EWTN — was established just a few weeks before we discovered it and began to include in at Beyond These Stone Walls. Click “Watch on YouTube” in the lower left corner to see how many people around the world are present there with you. The number appears below the symbol for EWTN.

Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.

The following is a translation from the Polish in the image above: “Eighth Star in the Crown of Mary Queen of Peace” “Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at Niepokalanow. World Center of Prayer for Peace.” “On September 1, 2018, the World Center of Prayer for Peace in Niepokalanow was opened. It would be difficult to find a more expressive reference to the need for constant prayer for peace than the anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.”

For the Catholic theology behind this image, visit my post, “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”