“There are few authentic prophetic voices among us, guiding truth-seekers along the right path. Among them is Fr. Gordon MacRae, a mighty voice in the prison tradition of John the Baptist, Maximilian Kolbe, Alfred Delp, SJ, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer.”
— Deacon David Jones
God in the Dock: When Bad Things Happen to Good People
I hear often from readers who struggle with a midlife crisis of faith. I have even had one of my own. Drifting from faith only disarms you from your one true defense.
I hear often from readers who struggle with a midlife crisis of faith. I have even had one of my own. Drifting from faith only disarms you from your one true defense.
March 8, 2023 by Fr. Gordon MacRae
Note from Father Gordon MacRae: In the image above Simon of Cyrene considers “Bearing the Cross,” by 19th Century German artist Ludwig Thiersch. (Plate 147 in The Great Painter’s Gospel).
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In 1982, the year of my priesthood ordination, Rabbi Harold Kushner caused a stir in the publishing world with his classic book, When Bad Things Happen to Good People. Rabbi Kushner addressed the question of the ages. Why does a benevolent, omnipotent God allow innocent people to suffer? The book was an instant bestseller. Our quest to answer that question has sent humanity down some strange and destructive side roads.
On October 21, 2021, we posted a title that alarmed the majority of our readers who saw it. It was, “The ‘Woke’ Have Commenced Our Totalitarian Re-Education.” Actually, I think it was the top graphic that shocked some but not quite enough into getting to the voting polls last November. A radically “woke” segment of our society has captured much of the news and social media and is rapidly moving to the center of social consciousness to become the new normal. The assault on gender and gender identity is its most obvious battleground. The assault on God, and life itself, is at its center.
The latest example comes, sadly, from Kamala Harris. In a recent speech she quoted from one of the nation’s foundational documents saying, “The Declaration of Independence guarantees the right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” For the Vice President of the United States to edit the Right to Life out of the Declaration of Independence is the height of hubris.
I wrote of the fallout from this trend in “Disney’ s Disenchanted Kingdom Versus Parental Rights.” Thousands of readers have since viewed the 50-minute Catholic League documentary, “Walt’s Disenchanted Kingdom.” Many have told me that it is an eye-opener. The heart of its message is that the Disney franchise has openly endorsed and promoted the indoctrination of young children on sexual identity and transgender issues — a trend forced upon us sparking Florida’s new parental rights law.
Ironically, our publisher went to link to the Catholic League documentary last month only to learn that YouTube restricted it from viewers under age 18. The hypocrisy of that is staggering. Fortunately, the Catholic League quickly found an alternative for viewing the landmark film so the link above is valid.
This seemingly political battle is a spiritual battle as well, and its second battleground is a conscious and deliberate intent to remove God from the public square in which we live. I was recently struck by some of the subtle rhetoric in network news coverage of the death of Queen Elizabeth II. Several news commentators expressed sentiments that Queen Elizabeth “is in our thoughts.” You might not think that strange, but it was a sentiment that seemed to take great pains to omit that she was also in our prayers.
This subtle restraint on language and content that acknowledges God is most visibly growing in education which sadly has become the indoctrination of the young to woke ideas. Actually, it is even worse than that. References to God or to any of the tenets of Judeo-Christian faith are not only discouraged, but actively suppressed. In a September, 2021 post, “The Parable of a Priest and the Parable of a Prisoner.” I told the story of the Prophet Jonah. After it was published, a reader sent me this humorous exchange between a second-grade student and his teacher. The teacher had been talking about the anatomy of whales:
Boy raising hand: “The Prophet Jonah was swallowed by a whale.”
Teacher: “Actually, Joseph, that is not possible. A whale could not swallow a man.”
Boy: “But it happened to Jonah. I read it in my Bible.”
Teacher: “Do you believe everything you read in the Bible?”
Boy: “Well... yes. God told the story.”
Teacher: “Well, it never happened.”
Boy: “When I go to Heaven I will ask Jonah if it is true.”
Teacher: “What if Jonah isn't in Heaven?”
Boy: “Then YOU can ask him.”
Actually, I liked my own ending of that story better. Once Jonah was coughed up by the giant fish in the parable, he could never sell it at market. There was no longer any prophet in it.
Photo | APK
God in the Dock
There are several accepted meanings of the word, “dock” in modern English. As a verb, it is a nautical term that means to tie off a boat at a pier or station that is also called a dock. It comes from an archaic Dutch word, “doken” which originally meant to submerge under water. There is an even more obsolete usage from the Flemish term, “docke” which refers to a place from which a defendant testifies before a judge. There are those in this culture who are hell-bent on placing God in that dock. It is human arrogance to even imagine that we could ever serve on a jury of God’s peers.
There is a third rail in our spiritual battleground that is manifested not so much in the denial of God, but in the blaming of God. It’s easy to refute or ignore God from a secure place of privilege. This is why some of the disenfranchised poor often seem to have greater faith than the entitled wealthy. They have more practice calling upon God in the absence of their own resources. The poor tend to be more attuned to the limits of human nature. Spiritual enrichment is often — but not always — in inverse proportion to material wealth.
As I set out to write this post about challenges to faith in the midst of suffering and loss, I received a moving and humbling account from a reader. It centers around a tragedy that took place in a New Hampshire Catholic parish. Sheila, a faithful parishioner, lost her 23-year-old daughter, Mary. In a high-profile case, Mary was murdered by a deeply troubled former boyfriend. Sheila’s 20-year-old son previously died from a cardiac abnormality, and her husband died in his 40s from the same illness.
How does someone cope with such a cascade of traumatizing loss? The account to follow is a moving excerpt from a eulogy letter that Sheila wrote and read after the Mass of Christian Burial for her daughter, Mary:
“Hail Mary, full of grace... Holy Mary... In ‘The Hail, Holy Queen,’ I resonate with the title of our Lady as ‘Mother of Mercy,’ as well as ‘to thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this Valley of Tears.’ I believe most of us, if not all of us, at one time or another have cried these tears in small or large amounts. In the Prayer to St. Michael, we are reminded of ‘The wickedness and snares of the devil.’
“As we live in these times, we continue to witness these valleys of tears and the wickedness and snares of the devil here on Earth within our lives. How does one find peace amongst all this turmoil? We may find it within the Lord’s Prayer, the prayer Jesus has given to us directly: ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.’
“If we are to find peace within ourselves, we must allow God to be one with us. He dwells within us, but we need to be in His graces to find true peace. There is no hate within God. He is pure love. Forgiveness is what He speaks of in the Lord’s Prayer. Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
“If I am to carry hate within me, and hold onto these thoughts of anger, how can I be able to pray for my daughter’s soul? I cannot expect God to hear my truest prayers for my daughter, Mary, if I am holding on to anger and hate within me. I want her soul to be swiftly received by our Lord, and to find her Eternal Peace with God the Almighty who is Eternal.
“We are sometimes given crosses that we see as a burden and filled with sorrow. We turn our backs to our Lord Jesus Christ and become angry and curse Him. Perhaps we do not realize what we have been given, what we are allowing ourselves to let go of. It’s His Love. We need to offer all this pain and suffering to our Lord through our Lady, Mary, His Mother. When we do that, we will receive 100-fold of graces.”
My heart also struggled with Sheila’s losses, and I pray that the Lord will ease her trials. We are summoned by such accounts to emulate Simon of Cyrene. We pray for Sheila while aware that we are united in the fellowship of the poor banished children of Eve, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. If privilege and entitlement stand in the way of our feeling such things, and praying such prayers, then we are pitiful indeed.
Prophetic Witness
My seminary years were spent in the awful 1970s at St. Mary Seminary & University in Baltimore, Maryland. While there, I learned first and foremost that no priest ever has a vocation to the seminary. There were always those for whom seminary life was not a means to an end, but a safe haven that was an end in itself. For some, leaving seminary to be thrust into priesthood was traumatic, like being raised out of the womb for the first time. None of us were ever prepared for the “Priests in Crisis” I described in a recent Catholic University of America study.
Perhaps the last few decades of “priesthood in the dock” have, if nothing else, grounded us in humility. There is an element in our Church that would look upon Sheila’s painful cross, and our friend Pornchai Moontri’s crushing life story, with something less than “there, but for the Grace of God, go I.” Simon of Cyrene never stopped to ask what Jesus did to deserve the Cross thrust upon Him. Simon just silently carried it, and was ultimately changed by doing so. There are readers who have helped us to carry our crosses as well. Without them, there was only despair.
A bishop visiting this prison for Mass several years ago had obviously been reading Beyond These Stone Walls. When Mass ended, and prisoners filed out of the prison chapel, the bishop grasped my arm as I passed and whispered four chilling words: “You are a prophet!” On our way out, Pornchai turned and asked, “What does that mean?” I responded, “It means my head is about to be lopped off!” As I have written in other posts, most of the saints we revere, and the prophets we heed, suffered greatly.
Pornchai was led from his own house of bondage, but Pope Benedict XVI was also influential in Pornchai’s conversion despite the severe trials that Pornchai faced in life. When Pornchai, a Buddhist since birth, first pondered the Catholic faith, he was moved by this segment of the brilliant book, Jesus of Nazareth (Doubleday, 2007) by Pope Benedict XVI:
“The most important thing about the figure of Moses is neither all the miraculous deeds he is reported to have done nor his many works and sufferings along the way from the ‘house of bondage in Egypt’ through the desert to the threshold of the Promised Land. The most important thing is that he spoke with God as with a friend... .
“It now becomes perfectly clear that the prophet is not the Israelite version of the soothsayer, as was widely held at the time and as many so-called prophets considered themselves. On the contrary, the prophet is something quite different. He shows us the Face of God, and in so doing he shows us the path we are to take. He points out the path to the true ‘exodus’ which consists in this: Among all the paths of history, the path to God is the true direction that we must seek and find.”
— Jesus of Nazareth, p4
Pornchai and I both faced many trials in life. It was our trials that thrust us into the same place and time in history. I do not know whether I ever spoke to God as a friend, but it was upon reading the above passage from Pope Benedict that Pornchai made his decision to journey with me from the exodus, through the desert, to the Promised Land toward which we, in hope, are destined. Faith never rescued us from our trials, but it taught us to carry one another’s cross like Simon of Cyrene. That is the key to Heaven. Even in suffering and sorrow, it is the key to Heaven.
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Note from Fr. Gordon MacRae: Thank you for reading and sharing this post. You may also like these related posts from Beyond These Stone Walls:
Paths I crossed with Benedict XVI and Cardinal George Pell
Priests in Crisis: The Catholic University of America Study
Pornchai Moontri reading from the Lectionary at Mass with Father John Hung Le, SVD and others from his order at the Divine Word Missionary Society Chapel in Nonthabury, Thailand.
One of our Patron Saints, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, founded a religious site in his native Poland called Niepokalanow. The site has a real-time live feed of its Adoration Chapel with Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. We invite you to spend some time before the Lord in a place that holds great spiritual meaning for us.
Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.
As you can see the monstrance for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is most unusual. It is an irony that all of you can see it but I cannot. So please remember me while you are there. For an understanding of the theology behind this particular monstrance of the Immaculata, see my post “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”
Truth Seekers Are the Prophets of Every Troubled Time
In a time of darkness, lies and death cling to Jesus, the Way, the Truth and the Life. Do not let go. Let Him shine His Light within you and on the world through you.
St. Dionysius the Areopagite | George E. Koronaios
In a time of darkness, lies and death cling to Jesus, the Way, the Truth and the Life. Do not let go. Let Him shine His Light within you and on the world through you.
By Dionysius the Areopagite
Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Dionysius the Areopagite came to believe in the truth of the Resurrection (Acts 17:34) while others only mocked. The author of this post is recently retired from a distinguished career as a scientist in U.S. government service.
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In “The Prison of Father MacRae: A Conspiracy of Silence,” Ryan A. MacDonald recounts an exchange he had with a prominent Catholic author, whom he does not identify. He had asked the author to take a look at the trial and imprisonment of Father Gordon MacRae. The man told him: “I don’t share your belief in Father MacRae’s innocence. I just don’t believe a judge and jury would sentence a priest to life in prison with anything less than clear and compelling evidence.” This reminds me of the principle Adolf Hitler presented in Mein Kampf
“The great masses of the people ... more easily fall victim to a big lie than to a little one.”
— Adolf Hitler
This author might accept that the justice system sometimes gets it wrong in small ways, that there might be a little corruption. Had Father MacRae been sentenced to a few years in prison, he might have considered looking into the case. But we live in America, the greatest nation in the world, with the best justice system in the world, he surely thinks. There can be no big corruption in the justice system, no horrific corruption. He blindly trusts the system.
Father MacRae lost his freedom because the truth of the case was totally suppressed. Instead of truth there was the fabrication of Detective James F. McLaughlin. There was the testimony of the accuser, Thomas Grover. He testified that on five weekly counseling sessions Father MacRae violently sexually abused him. When asked why he kept going back he replied that he repressed the memory of it all while having a weekly “out-of-body experience.” The accuser cried under much of the cross examination, which the judge quickly deflected protecting the accuser whom he had predetermined was a victim. There was also the dismissal of inconsistencies in the accuser’s testimony. Judge Arthur Brennan told the jury to “disregard inconsistencies in Mr. Grover’s testimony.”
But there was no testimony of the accused, Fr. MacRae. Then there were two appeals, which were summarily dismissed. The last one precluded any further appeal. The publication of the “Laurie List,” a list of police officers with founded credibility problems, included Detective James F. McLaughlin due to “falsification of records” in a case prior to Fr. MacRae’s trial. The required disclosure of this to the defense never happened. At no time in the trial nor in the appeals was there any minimal attempt to search for the truth.
We know about the truth of this case because there were people who cared about the truth and investigated the case following the facts to wherever they led: Dorothy Rabinowitz, Harvey Silverglate, Ryan A. MacDonald, former FBI Special Agent James Abbott, journalist Joann Wypijewski, Catholic League President Bill Donohue, The Media Report’s David F. Pierre, Jr. and others. These Truth Seekers all concluded that the Fr. MacRae case was a gross miscarriage of justice.
I have sketched the case of Fr. MacRae to point out that it was total suppression of the truth, and complete fabrication of the case that led to the preposterous outcome of sentencing an innocent priest to life in prison. It is a big lie. And “the great masses of people more easily fall victim to a big lie” (in this case believing Fr. MacRae is a criminal) “than to a little one,” according to that great master liar of the 20th Century, Adolf Hitler. It is ironic, but no coincidence, that in his closing argument before the jury in the Fr. MacRae trial, prosecutor Bruce Elliot Reynolds compared Fr. MacRae to Adolf Hitler. This is what happens when a case is brought before a court with no supporting evidence. The void must be filled with outrageous rhetoric.
In the 29 years since then Truth Seekers have shined light on the truth and on how evil this case was. Our unnamed writer is among the great masses, not to be counted among the Truth Seekers. Any rational, fair person who reads all the evidence of wrongdoing in suppressing the truth is convinced of the innocence of Fr. MacRae. The unnamed writer’s blindness to the truth probably had no effect on his job, or his health, or his life. (God knows the effect on his soul.) Blindness to the truth in other matters has grave consequences to the blind one.
Christ Healing the Blind by El Greco | Metropolitan Museum of Art
I Want to See — Mark 10:51
Big lies perpetrate great evil. The last three years since Covid have been dreadful — loss of life, loss of health, loss of jobs, loss of freedom, confusion, pain, much suffering. We want it to stop. We see evil all around — and we see goodness. But is what we see real or fabricated?
In the case of Father MacRae the fabricated evil is that he is a criminal who deserves to lose his freedom for the rest of his life. Instead, Truth Seekers revealed the total disregard of the justice system for truth and justice. The system criminally railroaded Fr. MacRae, and attacked the freedom of every citizen, of the Church, of Priesthood. This was the real evil in this case. Should we question what we see? Or should we blindly trust some authorities?
Test everything; hold fast what is good.
— 1 Thessalonians 5:21
Before Covid many had chanted, “My body, my choice.” Then came the Covid mandates, and some were chanting, “My body, my choice.” But the earlier chanters did not approve. As Judge Arthur Brennan would say, Disregard the inconsistencies. After the horror of the Holocaust, the Nuremberg Code set principles for the practice of human experimentation. Chief among them is that consent of the human subject is absolutely essential. The so-called vaccines and boosters are experimental; they fall under the Nuremberg code. Yet the mandates completely obliterate this code. Has the door been opened to new atrocities?
When this global pandemic began the logical thing would have been to gather the very best physicians and scientists to work out how to proceed. Instead, they were cancelled. Sacrificing much they have worked feverishly to save lives, and they have seen how all the actions the government has taken contradict fundamental medical principles. They are Truth Seekers at a time when there is an overwhelming effort to suppress truth. [24, 11, 13, 16]
As the Covid pandemic has unfolded more people have realized that there is a real evil that is different from the uncensored, fabricated evil. Jews have often taken great offense when the word Holocaust is used to describe other atrocities. Holocaust survivors, who have faced great evil before, now recognize what is going on as a Holocaust. They are among the Truth Seekers of today. [31, 3, 22, 14]
I sought the Lord, and he answered me, and delivered me from all my fears.
— Psalm 34:4
The past three years have been awful. Fear has been used to lock down, to control, to censor, to divide. As we listen to the Truth Seekers we find that the real evil is much worse than we thought. We can become even more fearful. But like never before this is a time to cling to Jesus. “Fear is useless, what is needed is trust.” Luke 8:50
In the uncensored, fabricated evil, it seems that the worse is almost over. The lockdowns are gone. Most people are not wearing masks anymore. It seems that normalcy may be coming back. Could reality be different? In Nazi times many people were saved. They escaped before being taken to concentration camps. But most of those taken to camps died. Are there concentration camps now?
Violating the Nuremberg code and with much coercion people were injected, outside physical concentration camps. Most people did not die soon after. Some did. Now people are dying in unprecedented numbers — people of all ages, many young healthy people, healthy athletes, many suddenly. And many people are getting very sick. The official story, the corporate story, is that this has nothing to do with the injections. [8, 2, 1, 25, 16]
I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life.
— John 14:6
Does truth matter? Consider the case of Father MacRae again. It can be described by two contrasting views: the ‘criminal’ view of the justice system, and the ‘victim’ view of the Truth Seekers. Looking at these two views, the author with whom Ryan A. MacDonald tried to discuss Father MacRae’s case, did not seek the truth. He choose the ‘criminal’ view because he blindly trusts the system promoting this view. Other than his spiritual life, the choice did not affect him.
Does truth matter in this other case? Two views describe the time in which we live. The ‘protection with loss of freedom’ is the view that the authorities are protecting us during a pandemic that started three years ago, and this requires the loss of some freedoms. The contrasting view is the ‘genocide’ view; plans began much earlier than three years ago, and the loss of freedoms is a way of implementing a depopulation plan.
In this case, if after considering the evidence for both views, you decide that the real view is ‘protection with loss of freedom,’ you learn to live with less freedom accepting that it is the only way you can be protected at this time. If, however, you decide that the ‘genocide’ is the real view, you might not want to cooperate with a system that is trying to kill you. You are not a casual observer. Your life and your freedom depend on being able to see which is the real view. [20, 23, 25, 26, 13, 30, 31, 33, 34, 35, 3, 7, 9]
Jesus said to him, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man replied to him, “Master, I want to see.”
— Mark 10:51
Photo | Wilf’s Wine Press
Without Me You Can Do Nothing — John 15:5
Many of us see much evil around us. Evil is attacking so many things, at so many levels, at different scales. Does it make any difference which evil we confront first? Or is there a more global, more fundamental, more horrifically diabolical evil than the rest? One that if not stopped the others would not matter any more. The references below are a sampler of the work of Truth Seekers who are working tirelessly to save the world, to open the eyes of the rest of us.
Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness!
— Isaiah 5:20
Critically examine the evidence these Truth Seekers present. Ask Jesus to help you see what is true and what is false, what is good and what is evil. The sacredness of life has been attacked for a long time. The combination of technology and loss of freedom gives rise to an unprecedented evil in which our resources, our bodies, even our consciousness will be controlled by others. What is at stake is our national sovereignty and our individual sovereignty. [21, 4, 14, 33]
In Nazi times people were saved before being taken to concentration camps. Once in a camp most did not survive. In these times, if we fail to resist this monstrous, evil attack we will all succumb to it. The time is late, but there is still something we can do. If we remain casual observers unwilling to discern the true evil that is encompassing us, we do not have a chance.
The Truth Seekers of our time suggest some actions we may take to protect ourselves, and resist the evil that is upon us.
Treatments: The best doctors in America, in collaboration with others around the world, developed treatments to prevent and deal with the aftermath of Covid. If you have taken any injections, do not take any more. There are protocols for Covid (prevention, early treatment, long Covid, hospital treatment, post-vaccine recovery), and RSV and the flu. [12]
Cash vs Digital Ids: There is a rush to implement Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs). If this succeeds, each of us will have a digital identity, and we will be living in a digital concentration camp. To try to resist this, use cash as much as possible. [4]
One World Totalitarian Government / WHO “Treaty:” The World Health Organization (WHO) is proposing a global pandemic treaty. The Administration is committed to the accord. Though it would be a treaty Congress will not be consulted. Many have looked at the details and see the end of national and individual autonomy. [6, 5, 21, 19, 27, 28, 29, 33] James Roguski has emerged as the foremost expert on the two proposals being pushed by the WHO, which he discusses in [32]
We are in Lent, a time of prayer and fasting:
“Is this not, rather, the fast that I choose: releasing those bound unjustly, untying the thongs of the yoke; Setting free the oppressed, breaking off every yoke?”
— Isaiah 58:6
But how can we break any yoke if we do not see it? And how can we see it if we pray not constantly?
Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can do nothing.
— John 15:5
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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Three years ago, early in 2020, I wrote a post about the burgeoning pandemic of Covid 19. My post rejected the Chinese Communist Government’s explanation of its origin. The CCG claimed, and still claims, that the SARS-CoV-2 virus originated by natural means through an animal sold at the Wuhan, China open market. I laid out a case for why this is likely not so, and why it is much more likely that the virus escaped from inside the Wuhan Institute of Virology where gain-of-function research and other experimentation was being conducted since 2013. This week, a classified intelligence report provided to the White House and key members of Congress concluded, along with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, that the Covid pandemic most likely arose from a Wuhan laboratory.
If the Chinese Communist Government had been transparent from the beginning, the world may have had a better response to this pandemic. But please remember: China is by force the People’s Republic, but Covid is by no means the people’s pandemic. The good people of China had nothing to do with this.
Please revisit my post, which lays out in stark prose all the dangers described by our guest writer in this week’s post when a system of government adopts the protection of itself over the protection of its people. Please read “The Chinese Communist Party and the True Origin of Covid-19.”
Bibliography
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Breggin, Peter R., Ginger Ross Breggin, COVID-19 and the Global Predators: We Are the Prey, Ithaca, NY, Lake Edge Press, 2021.
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Knightly, Kit, “WHO moving forward on GLOBAL vaccine passport program,” 03/01/2022, Off Guardian
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From the Editor: After reading this post, a reader sent us a link to a 10-minute video by Law Professor Francis Boyle related to the content of this post: Francis Boyle: The WHO’s Plan to Be a Global Dictator.
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 the image for live access 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.”
Eucharistic Adoration: Face to Face in Friendship with God
A live internet feed from a Eucharistic Adoration chapel in Poland arrived on this blog at Christmas and is now revealed as a special gift from our Patron Saint.
Photo | EWTN Poland
A live internet feed from a Eucharistic Adoration chapel in Poland arrived on this blog at Christmas and is now revealed as a special gift from our Patron Saint.
February 22, 2023 by Fr. Gordon MacRae
Books are occasionally sent to me from Catholic publishers with an invitation to write and publish a review. One of the books sent to me several years ago was, ironically, the Manual for Eucharistic Adoration created by The Poor Clare Sisters of Perpetual Adoration. I was surprised that it was sent to me because I am the only person among our readers who is unable to ever take part in Adoration before the Blessed Sacrament.
While perusing the Manual, I felt a sense of shame that as a younger priest when I actually had such opportunities, I never gave any thought to Eucharistic Adoration. I blithely dismissed it as akin to being invited to dinner just to stare at the food. That was a shallow and superficial dismissal of what would one day become a gift of central importance. It is human nature to want something more when you are told you can no longer have it. I wrote a post about receiving this book. It was likely the most unusual review the publisher ever got. I titled it, “Priesthood in the Real Presence and the Present Absence.”
The rest of this story has so many twists and turns that it is difficult to know exactly how to continue. So I will begin about ten days before Christmas in 2022. For reasons I do not understand, I asked our volunteer publisher to find and restore that book review post six years after I wrote it. It was one of the posts written for an older version of this blog so some revision was necessary for it to be viewed. I had it restored, but then never referred to it again — until months later.
Coming off the previous two dark years of pandemic restrictions and other chaos, I wanted to construct a 2022 Christmas post to inspire hope in a higher cause. During a phone call from prison with our publisher, we were constructing the various elements of “Lead Kindly Light: Our Christmas Card to Readers.” I asked readers who are alone at Christmas to spend some time with that post which contained inspirational music and other features.
When it was all put together, I had a last minute request that suddenly came to mind. I have been locked up with few resources and no access to the internet for going on 29 years, but I had read that there are online round-the-clock live feeds of Eucharistic Adoration and I was intrigued by this. So I asked our publisher to search for some of them. The first one she found was from a chapel in Poland. I could not see it but she described it to me. There were lots of other options, but I was fixated on that one and did not want to look any further.
Most devotees of Eucharistic Adoration know that the Blessed Sacrament is displayed in a vessel called a “monstrance.” It comes from the Latin, “monstrantia.” Oddly, the word “monster” comes from that same root. It means “portent,” the appearance of something of either amazing or calamitous importance.
I can receive photographs and letters sent electronically to a very limited GTL tablet in my cell, so I asked our publisher to send me a screen shot of the monstrance used for Adoration in that chapel in Poland. The next day, I was surprised to see it. It is Mary herself bearing, as she did in life, the Body of Christ. It is the image atop this post.
Photo | EpiskopatNews
A Woman Clothed with the Sun
In a typical presentation for Adoration, the monstrance for display of the Blessed Sacrament often resembles the rays of the Sun which gives life to the human body. Being in the Presence of the Lord gives life to the soul. The monstrance now atop this post depicts the “Woman Clothed with the Sun” (Revelation l2:l):
“A great portent appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the Sun, with the Moon under her feet and on her head, a crown of twelve stars. She was with child.”
I had previously written a very popular post about Mary with an account of how and why the Church honors her as the New Ark of the Covenant with the Greek title, Theotokos, which means “Bearer of God.” Some of our Protestant cousins protest the place Mary holds in our religious traditions, but the concern is misplaced. The Body of Christ came from Mary. His Soul and Divinity came from God.
The monstrance for Adoration in that chapel in Poland perfectly illustrates the theology I described in “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God” which is now linked under the Adoration Chapel announcement at the end of each post. Having seen this monstrance, I decided on the spot to include this opportunity for Adoration at the end of our Christmas post. I still cannot see it because I cannot see this blog. But you can see it, and I hoped that some of you might visit that Chapel in my stead.
The response to this at Christmas was excellent. So as the New Year dawned, I asked our publisher to make this a permanent feature at the end of every future post at Beyond These Stone Walls. I had no idea what was driving my sudden obsession for something I cannot even see. The answer to that was coming, however, and it left me stunned and speechless.
Two weeks after I decided to retain this Adoration Chapel from Poland as an opportunity for our readers, I returned from work in the prison law library and was called to pick up an item of personal property - another book. I felt a little irritated because receiving unexpected books sometimes means that I have to surrender a book in order to receive one. On that day, however, it did not happen. But I was still irritated. The Book was a newly published title from Marian Press sent to me for a possible review. It was The Way of Mercy: Pilgrimage in Catholic Poland by Stephen J. Binz .
After receiving the book, I climbed back up the 52 stairs to my cell and tossed it onto a small pile of books in a corner where it sat for a week. Then one sleepless night later in January, I finally picked it up and perused it in the dark with my little book light. It was a tour and historical commentary on the great Catholic shrines of Poland with featured sections on St. John Paul II, St. Maximilian Kolbe, St. Maria Faustina, and others about whom I had written. Poland was the birthplace of the powerful Divine Mercy devotion that had swept our lives here — both Pornchai Moontri’s and my own.
I turned to the section on Saint Maximilian Kolbe and began reading, then I bumped my head on the upper bunk as I suddenly sat up in shocked surprise. Staring back at me was the Adoration Chapel that we had just featured on this blog. How could this be? My mind was racing as I retraced the seemingly random steps resulting in our selection of this very place. The book offers this description, part of a detailed history of Niepokalanow, the City of the Immaculata that St. Maximilian Kolbe established prior to his arrest and imprisonment at Auschwitz:
“A passageway on the left leads to the Chapel of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, inaugurated in 2018. At the altar, a silver figure of Mary serves as a monstrance for the Blessed Sacrament under her heart.
“She was indeed the first monstrance, teaching us how to adore Jesus. The figure is surrounded by a wreath of silver lilies and golden rays. This World Center of Prayer for Peace is one of twelve international prayer centers for peace that are being established on all the continents of the world.
“The figure of Mary in the Adoration Chapel and the image of the Immaculata on the main altar contain elements of the Miraculous Medal of Mary Immaculate which was so beloved of St. Maximilian. The saint called the Miraculous Medal the spiritual “bullet” of his Militia in its war on all the powers that prevent a soul from embracing God wholeheartedly.”
Many readers already know the story of how Divine Mercy penetrated these prison walls to reach into my imprisonment and that of our friend, Pornchai Moontri. I wrote awhile back of how two great saints of the 20th Century — both from Catholic Poland — became personal role models for Divine Mercy and transformed our spiritual lives. You should not miss “A Tale of Two Priests : Maximilian Kolbe and John Paul II.” Here is an important excerpt:
“Perceived as a clear threat to the Nazi mindset, Maximilian was arrested and jailed for months in 1939 while his publishing ability was destroyed. Upon his release, he instituted the practice of round-the-clock Eucharistic Adoration for his community decades before it became common practice in parishes.”
After release from his first imprisonment, Father Maximilian continued to defy the Nazi regime by writing and publishing, and by aiding in the rescue of Jews. He was imprisoned again in 1941, but that time he was released only through his martyrdom. I wrote of how he faced death in “Saint Maximilian Kolbe and the Gift of Noble Defiance.”
Photo | EpiskopatNews
Face to Face with Divine Mercy
In the January 2023 issue of the monthly publication, Adoremus Bulletin, Father Justin Kizewski has an article entitled, “Face to Face and Eye to Eye: A Reflection on Eucharistic Adoration.” Father Kisewski traces the “Bread of the Presence” back in history some 4,000 years to Melchizedek, King of Salem which would become Jerusalem. Father Kizewski wrote of him:
“Melchizedek is that mysterious priest-king of Salem [who] feeds God’s pilgrim people in the person of Abraham and his companions with a sacrificial offering of bread and wine [Genesis 14:18]. This sacrificial offering of bread and wine was repeated in the Temple liturgy on a weekly basis. The priests would bake bread with incense mixed into it and pass it through the Holy of Holies before leaving it on a table in the sanctuary next to the tabernacle for the next week. The old bread that was replaced would be consumed by the priests.”
The Bread of the Temple sacrifice also came to be known in Jerusalem as the “Bread of the Presence” or the “Bread of the Face of God.” It symbolized an Old Testament anticipation of what was to become for us a far greater gift in the Eucharist. It is because of these ancient traditions that Jesus chose bread and wine as the elements for the first Eucharistic Feast known to us as “The Last Supper.” I wrote of these same events, and of the ancient priest-king Melchizedek in “The Feast of Corpus Christi and the Order of Melchizedek.”
For our Jewish spiritual ancestors, the Bread of the Presence was a sign of God’s saving work among His people. It recalled the Covenants of Abraham and Moses, the Exodus, the Passover, and most especially it recalled God’s love for us. Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is dynamic. As Father Justin Kizewski describes:
“When we look at the Eucharist, we see the Flesh of the One whose Mother carried him in her womb and bore him into the world. Analogously, when we adore the Eucharist ... we are meant to receive Him and ‘give birth’ to him in our daily life.”
Father Kizewski equates being present to the Lord in Adoration as like basking in sunlight. Early in this post I wrote that the monstrance for Adoration often has the appearance of rays from the Sun. We are changed in our essence during Adoration, like Moses was changed and his face became radiant in the Presence of Christ at the Transfiguration.
A few winters ago, I discovered that I have occasional bouts of psoriatic arthritis. The psoriasis appears on my face and scalp and it has at times been awful. I have just had to live with it. Then I read in a copy of The Epoch Times that limited time in sunlight is a potent treatment for psoriasis. Each day now, whenever the Sun is shining even in winter, I leave my work in the prison Law Library for a half hour to sit outside in the sunlight. It has helped immensely. The half hour speeds by as I sit alone to let the Sun penetrate what ails me.
Adoration is similar to that. We come face to face with the Lord in mutual love and fidelity. We let meeting his gaze change us and penetrates what ails our soul. Adoration brings Divine perspective to receiving Christ in the Eucharist, the True Bread from Heaven given for the Life of the World (John 6).
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Note from Fr. Gordon MacRae: The Gospel for the First Sunday of Lent is from Matthew 4:1-11. It is the account of the temptation of Christ in the desert and it has momentous implications for us during Lent and throughout our lives. I wrote of the story within this Gospel passage in “To Azazel: The Fate of a Church that Wanders in the Desert.”
Thank you for reading and sharing this post. You may also like these related posts from Beyond These Stone Walls:
Priesthood in the Real Presence and the Present Absence
A Tale of Two Priests : Maximilian Kolbe and John Paul II
Saint Maximilian Kolbe and the Gift of Noble Defiance
Fr. Seraphim Michalenko on a Mission of Divine Mercy
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From the Basilica of the Blessed Virgin Mary the Immaculate at Niepokalanow, Saint Maximilian Kolbe offering the world to Mary Our Mother | Photo | EpiscopatNews
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 the image for live access 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 Vatican Today: Cardinal George Pell’s Last Gift to the Church
In 2022 Vatican reporter Sandro Magister wrote of a memorandum by an anonymous author named Demos that circulated among cardinals who will elect a future pope. The identity of Demos is now revealed.
Jeff Grant | CNS
In 2022 Vatican reporter Sandro Magister wrote of a memorandum by an anonymous author named Demos that circulated among cardinals who will elect a future pope. The identity of Demos is now revealed.
February 15, 2023 by George Cardinal Pell with a Forward by Father Gordon MacRae
Forward: After publishing “Paths I Crossed with Benedict XVI and Cardinal George Pell” one week ago, I received a letter from Sheryl C. Collmer, a writer for Crisis Magazine from Tyler, Texas. Readers may recall that Sheryl was my intermediary with Cardinal Pell during his unjust imprisonment as described in that post. The following is an excerpt from her recent letter:
“I know you were heartbroken, as was I, at the news of Cardinal Pell’s death. … I had also been disappointed that he had not published much after he was released from prison. I was expecting perhaps a gun-blazing, fire-spouting, verbal whirlwind of orthodoxy. I think I was hoping he would ‘rescue’ the Church from the downward spiral we are in. … But when I read the ‘Demos’ letter, BAM! There is the Pell I was hoping for! The reason I admired Cardinal Pell from the first was because he was a fighter for the truth.”
When I learned that the author of the “Demos” (Greek for “people”) letter was Cardinal Pell, I felt compelled to share this with our readers. What follows is Cardinal George Pell’s last gift to the faithful.
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The Vatican Today
Commentators of every school, if for different reasons … agree that this pontificate is a disaster in many or most respects; a catastrophe.
The Successor of St. Peter is the rock on which the Church is built, a major source and cause of worldwide unity. Historically (St. Irenaeus), the Pope and the Church of Rome have a unique role in preserving the apostolic tradition, the rule of faith, in ensuring that the Churches continue to teach what Christ and the apostles taught. Previously it was: “Roma locuta. Causa finita est.” Today it is: “Roma loquitur. Confusio augetur.”
(A) The German synod speaks on homosexuality, women priests, communion for the divorced. The Papacy is silent.
(B) Cardinal Hollerich rejects the Christian teaching on sexuality. The Papacy is silent. This is doubly significant because the Cardinal is explicitly heretical; he does not use code or hints. If the Cardinal were to continue without Roman correction, this would represent another deeper breakdown of discipline, with few (any?) precedents in history. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith must act and speak.
(C) The silence is emphasised when contrasted with the active persecution of the Traditionalists and the contemplative convents.
The Christo-centricity of teaching is being weakened; Christ is being moved from the centre. Sometimes Rome even seems to be confused about the importance of a strict monotheism, hinting at some wider concept of divinity; not quite pantheism, but like a Hindu panentheism variant.
(A) Pachamama is idolatrous; perhaps it was not intended as such initially.
(B) The contemplative nuns are being persecuted and attempts are being made to change the teachings of the charismatics.
(C) The Christo-centric legacy of St. John Paul II in faith and morals is under systematic attack. Many of the staff of the Roman Institute for the Family have been dismissed; most students have left. The Academy for Life is gravely damaged, e.g., some members recently supported assisted suicide. The Pontifical Academies have members and visiting speakers who support abortion.
The lack of respect for the law in the Vatican risks becoming an international scandal. These issues have been crystalized through the present Vatican trial of ten accused of financial malpractices, but the problem is older and wider.
(A) The Pope has changed the law four times during the trial to help the prosecution.
(B) Cardinal Becciu has not been treated justly because he was removed from his position and stripped of his cardinalatial dignities without any trial. He did not receive due process. Everyone has a right to due process.
(C) As the Pope is head of the Vatican state and the source of all legal authority, he has used this power to intervene in legal procedures.
(D) The Pope sometimes (often) rules by papal decrees (motu proprio) which eliminate the right to appeal of those affected.
(E) Many staff, often priests, have been summarily dismissed from the Vatican Curia, often without good reason.
(F) Phone tapping is regularly practised. I am not sure how often it is authorized.
(G) In the English case against Torzi, the judge criticised the Vatican prosecutors harshly. They are either incompetent and/or were nobbled, prevented from giving the full picture.
(H) The raid by the Vatican Gendarmeria, led by Dr. Giani in 2017 on the auditor’s (Libero Milone) office on Italian territory was probably illegal and certainly intimidating and violent. It is possible that evidence against Milone was fabricated.
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(A) The financial situation of the Vatican is grave. For the past ten years (at least), there have nearly always been financial deficits. Before COVID, these deficits ranged around €20 million annually. For the last three years, they have been around €30-35 million annually. The problems predate both Pope Francis and Pope Benedict.
(B) The Vatican is facing a large deficit in the Pensions Fund. Around 2014 the experts from COSEA estimated the deficit would be around €800 million in 2030. This was before COVID.
(C) It is estimated that the Vatican has lost €217 million on the Sloane Avenue property in London. In the 1980’s, the Vatican was forced to pay out $230 million after the Banco Ambrosiano scandal. Through inefficiency and corruption during the past 25-30 years, the Vatican has lost at least another €100 million, and it probably would be much higher (perhaps 150-200 million).
(D) Despite the Holy Father’s recent decision, the process of investing has not been centralized (as recommended by COSEA in 2014 and attempted by the Secretariat for the Economy in 2015-16) and remains immune to expert advice. For decades, the Vatican has dealt with disreputable financiers avoided by all respectable bankers in Italy.
(E) The return on the 5261 Vatican properties remains scandalously low. In 2019, the return (before COVID) was nearly $4,500 a year. In 2020, it was €2,900 per property.
(F) The changing role of Pope Francis in the financial reforms (incomplete but substantial progress as far as reducing crime is concerned, much less successful, except at IOR, in terms of profitability) is a mystery and an enigma.
Initially the Holy Father strongly backed the reforms. He then prevented the centralization of investments, opposed the reforms and most attempts to unveil corruption, and supported (then) Archbishop Becciu, at the centre of Vatican financial establishment. Then in 2020, the Pope turned on Becciu and eventually ten persons were placed on trial and charged. Over the years, few prosecutions were attempted from AIF reports of infringements.
The external auditors Price Waterhouse and Cooper were dismissed and the Auditor General Libero Milone was forced to resign on trumped up charges in 2017. They were coming too close to the corruption in the Secretariat of State.
The political influence of Pope Francis and the Vatican is negligible. Intellectually, Papal writings demonstrate a decline from the standard of St. John Paul II and Pope Benedict. Decisions and policies are often “politically correct”, but there have been grave failures to support human rights in Venezuela, Hong Kong, mainland China, and now in the Russian invasion.
There has been no public support for the loyal Catholics in China who have been intermittently persecuted for their loyally to the Papacy for more than 70 years. No public Vatican support for the Catholic community in Ukraine, especially the Greek Catholics.
These issues should be revisited by the next Pope. The Vatican’s political prestige is now at a low ebb.
At a different, lower level, the situation of Tridentine traditionalists (Catholic) should be regularised.
At a further and lower level, the celebration of “individual” and small group Masses in the mornings in St. Peter’s Basilica should be permitted once again. At the moment, this great basilica is like a desert in the early morning.
The COVID crisis has covered up the large decline in the number of pilgrims attending Papal audiences and Masses.
The Holy Father has little support among seminarians and young priests and wide-spread disaffection exists in the Vatican Curia.
The Next Conclave
The College of Cardinals has been weakened by eccentric nominations and has not been reconvened after the rejection of Cardinal Kasper’s views in the 2014 consistory. Many Cardinals are unknown to one another, adding a new dimension of unpredictability to the next conclave.
After Vatican II, Catholic authorities often underestimated the hostile power of secularization, the world, flesh, and the devil, especially in the Western world and overestimated the influence and strength of the Catholic Church.
We are weaker than 50 years ago and many factors are beyond our control, in the short term at least, e.g. the decline in the number of believers, the frequency of Mass attendance, the demise or extinction of many religious orders.
The Pope does not need to be the world’s best evangelist, nor a political force. The successor of Peter, as head of the College of Bishops, also successors of the Apostles, has a foundational role for unity and doctrine. The new pope must understand that the secret of Christian and Catholic vitality comes from fidelity to the teachings of Christ and Catholic practices. It does not come from adapting to the world or from money.
The first tasks of the new pope will be to restore normality, restore doctrinal clarity in faith and morals, restore a proper respect for the law and ensure that the first criterion for the nomination of bishops is acceptance of the apostolic tradition. Theological expertise and learning are an advantage, not a hinderance for all bishops and especially archbishops.
These are necessary foundations for living and preaching the Gospel.
If the synodal gatherings continue around the world, they will consume much time and money, probably distracting energy from evangelization and service rather than deepening these essential activities.
If the national or continental synods are given doctrinal authority, we will have a new danger to world-wide Church unity, whereby e.g., the German church holds doctrinal views not shared by other Churches and not compatible with the apostolic tradition.
If there was no Roman correction of such heresy, the Church would be reduced to a loose federation of local Churches, holding different views, probably closer to an Anglican or Protestant model, than an Orthodox model.
An early priority for the next pope must be to remove and prevent such a threatening development, by requiring unity in essentials and not permitting unacceptable doctrinal differences. The morality of homosexual activity will be one such flash point.
While the younger clergy and seminarians are almost completely orthodox, sometimes quite conservative, the new Pope will need to be aware of the substantial changes effected on the Church’s leadership since 2013, perhaps especially in South and Central America. There is a new spring in the step of the Protestant liberals in the Catholic Church.
Schism is not likely to occur from the left, who often sit lightly to doctrinal issues. Schism is more likely to come from the right and is always possible when liturgical tensions are inflamed and not dampened.
Unity in the essentials. Diversity in the non-essentials. Charity on all issues.
Despite the dangerous decline in the West and the inherent fragility and instability in many places, serious consideration should be given to the feasibility of a visitation on the Jesuit Order. They are in a situation of catastrophic numerical decline from 36,000 members during the Council to less than 16,000 in 2017 (with probably 20-25% above 75 years of age). In some places, there is catastrophic moral decline.
The order is highly centralized, susceptible to reform or damage from the top. The Jesuit charism and contribution have been and are so important to the Church that they should not be allowed to pass away into history undisturbed or become simply an Asian-African community.
The disastrous decline in Catholic numbers and Protestant expansion in South America should be addressed. It was scarcely mentioned in the Amazonian Synod.
Obviously, a lot of work is needed on the financial reforms in the Vatican, but this should not be the most important criterion in the selection of the next Pope.
The Vatican has no substantial debts but continuing annual deficits will eventually lead to bankruptcy. Obviously, steps will be taken to remedy this, to separate the Vatican from criminal accomplices and balance revenue and expenditure. The Vatican will need to demonstrate competence and integrity to attract substantial donations to help with this problem.
Despite the improved financial procedures and greater clarity, continuing financial pressures represent a major challenge, but they are much less important than the spiritual and doctrinal threats facing the Church, especially in the First World.
Demos
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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: Cardinal Pell had another final message for Catholics: “Be not afraid.” It was on his coat of arms. Please share this important post, which gives much hope to faithful Catholics concerned for the future of the Church. You may also like these related posts:
Paths I Crossed with Benedict XVI and Cardinal George Pell
Priests in Crisis: The Catholic University of America Study
One of our Patron Saints, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, founded a religious site in his native Poland called Niepokalanow. The site has a real-time live feed of its Adoration Chapel with Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. We invite you to spend some time before the Lord in a place that holds great spiritual meaning for us.
Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.
As you can see the monstrance for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is most unusual. It is an irony that all of you can see it but I cannot. So please remember me while you are there. For an understanding of the theology behind this particular monstrance of the Immaculata, see my post “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”
Paths I Crossed with Benedict XVI and Cardinal George Pell
In strange ways, injustices I have known as a prisoner and a priest intersected the lives of Pope Benedict XVI and Cardinal George Pell who died just ten days apart.
Paul Haring | CNS
In strange ways, injustices I have known as a prisoner and a priest intersected the lives of Pope Benedict XVI and Cardinal George Pell who died just ten days apart.
February 8 , 2023 by Fr. Gordon MacRae
Pope Benedict XVI passed from this life at age 95 on the final day of 2022. Ten days later, Cardinal George Pell died of cardiac arrest at age 81 while recovering from routine surgery at a hospital in Rome. Both of these men were giants in the Church as the many tributes to them from around the world make clear. They were also targets for much vitriol and injustice. It was in this targeted injustice that my path crossed with that of both men.
In “Justice Delayed for Father MacRae,” a recent op-ed in The Wall Street Journal by famed Boston criminal defense and civil liberties attorney Harvey Silverglate, he cited a ground-breaking book by Dorothy Rabinowitz, a member of the Journal’s Editorial Board entitled, No Crueler Tyrannies: Accusations, False Witness, and Other, Terrors of Our Time. Ms. Rabinowitz was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for her collection of writings about unjust sex abuse prosecutions that generated a spate of wrongful convictions of innocent people in the 1980s and 1990s. Some of her subjects in the book and subsequent writings spent decades in prison. I am one of them.
One of the tragically misguided prosecutions cited in the book is that of Margaret Kelly Michaels, then a 24-year-old nursery school teacher in New Jersey. Charged with multiple counts of child molestation in a witch hunt atmosphere, Kelly was innocent of the heinous crimes, none of which actually took place. The charges were fantastical and false, but the child abuse terror of the time resulted in easy convictions with no valid evidence.
The nature of the evidence in Kelly’s case was chilling. The prosecution’s child psych expert — who had no real expertise at all — fashioned a theory that young children who say that no sexual abuse happened actually mean the opposite. A vigilante jury bought that theory and convicted Kelly Michaels. At age 24, she was sentenced to 47 years in prison.
After failed appeals having nothing whatsoever to do with truth or justice, Kelly’s fate seemed sealed in wrongful imprisonment until Dorothy Rabinowitz began writing about it. Then New York civil rights attorney Morton Stavis came out of retirement to take the case pro bono. In her book, Ms. Rabinowitz revealed that Mr. Stavis sought the aid of a New York-based left-leaning legal think tank, the Center for Constitutional Rights that he himself founded. The CCR wanted nothing to do with this case. As Ms. Rabinowitz explained:
“Arguing for due process on behalf of a person charged with child sex abuse violated the politically progressive views held by many at the center. In the 1980s, as today, there was a school of advanced political opinion of the view that to take up for those falsely accused of sex abuse was to undermine the battle against child abuse. It was to betray children and other victims of sexual predators.”
No Crueler Tyrannies, 17-18
The charges against me stem from the same time period, filtered through the same progressive political opinions, and hyped by the same prosecutorial mindset that to be accused of such things is to be guilty. It is the cruelest of tyrannies that even our Catholic bishops have cowed in fear under that progressive steamroller as priests so accused are discarded without defense. This was articulated in my recent post, “Priests in Crisis: The Catholic University of America Study.”
The heroic attorney Morton Stavis was not defeated by the progressive disdain for his effort from his own tribe at the Center for Constitutional Rights. He did not live to see his victory in this case, but he had put together a small team of righteous defenders who eventually prevailed by exposing the truth and winning Kelly’s freedom. One of these defenders was Robert Rosenthal whose prior legal briefs on my behalf are still on display at the National Center for Reason and Justice.
Kelly Michaels went on in life to marry a judge. She eventually recovered — to the extent one can — from the tyranny of wrongful imprisonment. She has corresponded with me in freedom, imparting as much hope for justice as she can by urging me to never give up. I haven’t, but I will be 70 on my next birthday and like Job, I know that my Redeemer lives (Job 19:25).
Vincenzo Pinto | AFP
Benedict’s “Crimes against Humanity”
However, reading Dorothy’s book was unfortunately not my final encounter with the Center for Constitutional Rights. Clinging to the progressive view that to be accused of sexual abuse is to be guilty, the Center for Constitutional Rights allowed itself to be duped and used by SNAP, the activist group Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. I wrote a post some time ago that seemed to mark the beginning of the end of this organization's campaign to destroy any due process for Catholic priests. The post was, “David Clohessy Resigns SNAP in Alleged Kickback Scheme.”
Prior to writing that post, David Clohessy and SNAP manipulated the Center for Constitutional Rights into bringing a “crimes against humanity” charge against Pope Benedict XVI and the Vatican at the International Criminal Court at The Hague in the Netherlands. It was a shameless publicity stunt that had no hope of success, but was filed only to shame Pope Benedict and bring attention to SNAP.
Though I was aware of the charge, it was only after the International Criminal Court dismissed it that I learned that I was an unwitting pawn in this debacle. Journalist Joann Wypijewski, a reporter of courage and high integrity, wrote of it in her blistering review of the movie “Spotlight,” a film about The Boston Globe Spotlight Team coverage of the sexual abuse scandal. The following is an excerpt of her bold article, “Spotlight Oscar Hangover: Why ‘Spotlight’ Is a Terrible Film”:
“The film’s advertisement for SNAP, the Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests, faithfully represents the Globe’s affiliation. It elides SNAP’s belief that wrongful prosecutions are a minor price to pay in pursuit of its larger mission, something [The Boston Globe] did not much concern itself with either as it collected its Pulitzer for service in the public interest; something even the Center for Constitutional Rights disregarded in 2011 when it joined with SNAP to file a grotesque brief to the International Criminal Court demanding ‘investigation and prosecution’ of the Vatican for crimes against humanity.
“Liberals who cheer this sort of thing ought to ponder whether they have any principles at all ... . The CCR brief failed ... but to CCR’s shame, Father MacRae is specifically mentioned in that brief, with respect to allegations of videotape (that is, child porn), which prosecutors threw in at sentencing but for which there is no evidence according to the lead detective in the case cited by [Dorothy] Rabinowitz.”
I was frozen in place by grief upon first learning of this. I knew that the charge had no substance. I also knew that in her WSJ investigation, Dorothy Rabinowitz confronted NH Detective James McLaughlin who first contrived the charge. Cornered, he finally admitted, “There was never any evidence of pornography.”
This did not stop SNAP and CCR from including it in a falsified brief before the International Criminal Court. There was no repercussion for the attempt at fraud upon the court. Even now, as recently as a few months ago, biased NH reporter Damien Fisher— whose wife Catholic blogger Simcha Fisher has ties to my diocese — repeated the pornography allegation without even mentioning that it had been widely discredited, including by the dishonest detective who first raised it.
All the claims that Pope Benedict XVI enabled accused priests and failed to protect victims are of a kind with the above story. In the end, it was never any of this that really made him a target. It was his orthodoxy, his fidelity, his clear-minded exposure of Catholic truths. None of this could ever successfully be assailed, so instead they smeared him with a weapon straight from hell: false witness. Let that sink in.
The Exoneration of George Cardinal Pell
In the same manner that Kelly Michaels reached out to me upon her exoneration, it was because I had been so falsely accused that I reached out to Cardinal George Pell during his 400 days of unjust imprisonment. Having come to recognize signposts of dishonesty in such a case, I was certain that Cardinal Pell had been falsely accused. But because of prison rules barring direct contact with other prisoners, I could not contact in prison directly.
A friend, Sheryl Collmer, a Tyler, Texas writer for Crisis Magazine and other venues, was my intermediary. I know that pride is one of the Seven Deadly Sins, but in this case it was perhaps a bit less deadly. There have been few really proud moments during my imprisonment, but my ability to detect and expose the truth in support of Cardinal Pell was one of them.
As a result, I found this excerpt in his published Prison Journal Volume 2 (Ignatius Press 2021). It was written from his prison cell:
“Friday, 2 August 2019: By a coincidence, today I received from Sheryl Collmer, a regular correspondent from Texas, a copy of the 15 May 2019 post on the blog, Beyond These Stone Walls, written by Fr Gordon MacRae. The article was entitled, ‘Was Cardinal George Pell Convicted on Copycat Testimony?’
“Fr MacRae was convicted on 23 September 1994 of paedophilia and sentenced to sixty-seven years in a New Hampshire prison for crimes allegedly committed around fifteen to twenty years previously. The allegations had no supporting evidence and no corroboration.
“It is one thing to be jailed for five months. It would be quite another step up, which I would not relish, to spend another three years if my appeal were unsuccessful. But we enter another world with a life sentence. Australia is not New Hampshire, and I don’t believe all the Australia media would blackball the discussion of a case such as MacRae’s.
“The late Cardinal Avery Dulles, whom I admired personally and as a theologian, encouraged Fr MacRae to continue writing from jail, stating, ‘Someday, your story and that of your fellow sufferers will come to light and be instrumental in a reform.’
“Fr MacRae recounts extraordinary similarities between the accusations I faced and the accusations of Billy Doe in Philadelphia, which were published in Australia in 2011 in the magazine, Rolling Stone. Earlier this year, Keith Windshuttle, editor of the quality journal Quadrant, publicized the seven points of similarity, pointing out that ‘there are far too many similarities in the stories for them to be explained by coincidence.’ (See Keith Windshuttle, ‘The Borrowed Testimony that Convicted George Pell,’ Quadrant, 8 April 2019).
“The author of the 2011 Rolling Stone article was Sabrina Rubin Erdely, no longer a journalist, disgraced and discredited. In 2014 she had written, and provoked a storm which reached Obama's White House, about ‘Jackie’ at the University of Virginia, who claimed she was gang-raped at a fraternity party in 2012 by seven men.
“As Fr MacRae points out, ‘The story was accepted as gospel truth once it appeared in print.’ [Note: Rolling Stone later retracted the article in 2015] . Jackie’s account turned out to be a massive lie. A civil trial for defamation followed; the seven students were awarded $7.5 million in damages by the jury; and Rolling Stone was found guilty of negligence and defamation.
“The allegations behind the 2011 Rolling Stone article, published in Australia, have also been demolished as false by, among others, Ralph Cipriano’s ‘The Legacy of Billy Doe’ published in the Catalyst of the Catholic League in January-February 2019. No one realized in 2015, when the allegations against me were first made to police, that the model for copycat allegations, or the innocent basis for the remarkable similarities, was also a fantasy or a fiction.
“I am grateful to Fr MacRae for taking up my cause, as I am to many others. These include in North America George Weigel and Fr Raymond de Souza and here in Australia Andrew Bolt, Miranda Devine, Gerard Henderson, Fr Frank Brennan, and others behind the scenes.
“I will conclude, not with a prayer, but with Fr MacRae’s opening quotation from Baron de Montesquieu (1742) [from the BTSW About Page], ‘There is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetrated under the shield of law and in the name of justice]’”
Addendum
You may see — from Cardinal Pell’s last citation above — where Dorothy Rabinowitz got the inspiration for the title of her book, No Crueler Tyrannies. Once free from his wrongful prison sentence, Cardinal Pell was restored to his rightful position in Rome. From there, he reached out to me again in ways that I only learned about posthumously. He wrote to a mutual friend that he plans to refer to my situation in talks he is slated to present in Rome and Australia. He never got to present them.
In an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, “Cardinal George Pell Faced Down a Hostile World” (January 13, 2023), Fr Raymond de Souza wrote that “His faith even during wrongful detention, was the crown of an inspiring Catholic life.” Reading his Prison Journal, I have no doubt been so inspired.
It is my prayer, and perhaps not even a necessary one, that Pope Benedict and Cardinal Pell both now stand in the Presence of God where they behold the fruition of all the graces bestowed upon them, and hopefully now upon us through them. We have not heard the last of them.
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Note from Fr. Gordon Mac Rae: Thank you for reading and sharing this post. You may also wish to visit these related posts from Beyond These Stone Walls:
From Down Under, the Exoneration of George Cardinal Pell
The Path of Sabrina Rubin Erdely’s Rolling Stone
Miranda Devine, Cardinal Pell, and the Laptop from Hell
Priests in Crisis: The Catholic University of America Study
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Francesco Sforza | Osservatore Romano | AFP
One of our Patron Saints, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, founded a religious site in his native Poland called Niepokalanow. The site has a real-time live feed of its Adoration Chapel with Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. We invite you to spend some time before the Lord in a place that holds great spiritual meaning for us.
Click or tap the image for live access to the Adoration Chapel.
As you can see the monstrance for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is most unusual. It is an irony that all of you can see it but I cannot. So please remember me while you are there. For an understanding of the theology behind this particular monstrance of the Immaculata, see my post “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”
Holy Orders in an Unholy Collision with a Disposable Culture
Dealing with the sex abuse crisis has led many bishops to now treat priests as disposable for any infraction resulting in a serious erosion of Catholic theology.
Dealing with the sex abuse crisis has led many bishops to now treat priests as disposable for any infraction resulting in a serious erosion of Catholic theology.
February 1, 2023 by Father Stuart MacDonald, JCL
Note from Father Gordon MacRae: A few weeks ago in these pages I published, “Priests in Crisis: The Catholic University of America Study.” Because it was highly recommended to the huge membership of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, it was one of our most read posts of the year. I then invited Father Stuart MacDonald, JCL, a priest and canon lawyer who serves as advisor to this blog to present a guest post analyzing the same topic and its importance to the Church. Father Stuart’s last post here was “Bishops, Priests and Weapons of Mass Destruction.”
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I finally went, reluctantly, to a performance of the musical Hamilton. Neither American history nor rap are my particular interests; however, a friend convinced me to go. I am unqualified to offer any observations on the theatrical performance; however, I was indignant at the final message of the show and the audience reaction to it. In a nutshell, if you haven’t seen it, Hamilton is the story of Alexander Hamilton, a founding father of the United States of America and the author of a large number of the Federalist Papers. He was perhaps the first American politician to become involved in a public sex scandal involving marital infidelity. The musical suggests that history has been unkind to Hamilton and that his infidelity played a role in this. It concludes with a rousing song about one’s reputation and posterity. In other words, Hamilton was a great guy and how silly of us to judge his whole career by a single moral failing.
I could not agree more. But let’s face it, the hypocrisy of modern, woke, me-too movement aficionados rapturously cheering this message is comical. In less than a decade, North American culture has accepted as unquestionable the notion that it is unacceptable for leaders of any kind to have lapses in judgment or moral failings. When they do, in the current me-too mindset, they deserve to be cancelled, obliterated from history, never to be seen, heard from, or discussed again except, I realize, when it comes to Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton, the play, is a huge success being performed in several places throughout the world. Does no one else see the hypocrisy? Do people not think anymore? (No, don’t answer that question yet.)
Most readers are aware of the National Study of Priests conducted by The Catholic Project at the Catholic University of America. Father Gordon MacRae wrote of it with his usual aplomb in the link atop this post. What some of you may not have seen is an equally worthwhile analysis of it in Catholic World Report, entitled, “The National Survey of Priests Suggests a Deep Crisis in Catholic Theology,” by Msgr. Thomas Guarino. Father MacRae and I both highly recommend it and we will link to it again at the end of this post.
The import of the study, and the two articles linked above, is the fact that priests, not just in the United States to which all of the above-noted articles are limited, are suffering from a fear of the modern, woke, me-too movement aficionados who seem to be as prevalent in the Church as they are in the world. I do not need to reiterate the scenario of a priest being accused, removed from ministry and either being dismissed from the clerical state or left in limbo on so-called administrative leave. In cases too many to count, priests are abandoned, having been prohibited from exercising any priestly ministry, save the celebration of Mass in private.
Let me be clear, I am not referring to priests accused of sexual abuse of a minor. While the scourge of the sexual abuse crisis is going to be with us for a long time yet, the unfortunate and concomitant truth is that priests are now sitting ducks for any type of accusation. It is specifically to the other stuff that I am referring. Dealing with the sex abuse crisis, however, has led many bishops and Church leaders to think that priests are now like chattel, pieces of property who can be used or discarded at will. The praxis in the Church these days is that a priest can act as a priest only with the explicit permission of his bishop or superior. To put it another way, it is as if a priest is ordained and receives the sacrament of Holy Orders, but the power of those orders is like a tap is turned on or off by the bishop.
Perhaps Father has fallen into sin with a woman, someone doesn’t like Father’s preaching, or maybe Father is insisting on his right to offer Mass ad orientem, or, Heaven forbid, Father uses vulgar language in a fit of anger or impatience (pace the news reports, if indeed true, of Pope Francis’ recent tirade with seminarians from Barcelona). Any of those things, to name just a few, can lead to a priest’s removal from ministry cast into a form of canonical limbo with no defense and from which he may never emerge. The idea seems to have taken over the collective episcopal mindset that a priest exercises his Sacred Orders at his bishop’s unfettered discretion. As Father Thomas Guarino points out so well in his article at the end of this post, this has serious consequences for the Catholic theology of priesthood.
The Expulsion from Eden by Gustave Doré
Catholic Crime and Punishment
Of course, the Church and bishops need to maintain discipline and authority among clergy and religious. No one questions that. But one does rightly question the overreach of control that has crept into our day to day living. Not every bad behavior, or even sinful behavior of a priest is an ecclesiastical crime for which he can be punished or even destroyed. Clearly, if a priest violates his promise of celibacy by sexual acts with an adult woman who is not his parishioner, he commits a mortal sin for which he must repent and do penance like all other sinners. But the Church does not say he has committed a crime. A crime exists, in these specific circumstances, only if he begins to live with her in a married fashion (it doesn’t mean he literally has to live in the same house with her). That is the sin and crime of concubinage.
The last punishment meted out to a priest guilty of that crime is dismissal from the clerical state. It is not the automatic penalty. Clearly, the mind of the Church is that clerics are capable of very serious sin, and the greater is their fall when that happens; but it is naïve to think that clerics are not going to sin, or that some clerics will never commit sexual sins. There is a reason why the Church has had laws against such behavior from the earliest days of her existence.
So, what is happening today? The public backlash from the sexual abuse crisis has placed bishops and religious superiors on edge. No one likes to be unpopular. In an effort to re-instill confidence that the Church is no longer turning a blind eye to the nefarious actions of some clergy with minors, bishops are just appearing ‘tough on crime’ in general. Therefore, anything that a priest does which might reach the ears of the bishop is now fodder for tough disciplinary action. Notice the change in terminology. It is not crime, which would involve inflicting penalties (like suspension, excommunication) using penal law and processes (like criminal law, trials, and sentencing in the civil sphere). Rather, it is disciplinary action for behavior that is not a crime.
The priest who has grievously sinned with a woman, and who has repented of his sin which remains unknown to the public, is now removed as pastor, has had his faculties for preaching and confessions revoked, is forbidden from celebrating Mass in public, and cannot present himself as a priest. All of that for something that is not a crime. No one would tolerate that in the civil sphere. Let me remind you, as Father MacRae has written elsewhere that Saint Padre Pio was falsely accused of all these things and spent years under the unjust cloud of suspicion.
Analogies always fail in some way, I realize, but imagine that you are a manager of a large store of a famous brand name and your supervisor finds out that you committed perjury in court over a traffic accident. Would the supervisor be justified in terminating your employment over actions which did not directly encompass your work duties? Does the priest deserve reprimand? Yes. Should he be advised that any future fall will constitute a crime for which he will be punished? Certainly. Does he deserve immediate dismissal? I don’t think so, no more than the store manager deserves to be punished by his employer. Does his dishonesty raise a red flag about his integrity? Yes. Should his supervisor monitor dishonesty in the workplace? Yes. But it is difficult to imagine that he should be terminated. When priests are terminated or cancelled in this way, the Sacrament of Holy Orders is much diminished, reduced to mere employment from which a priest can be discarded.
It is precisely this situation that has caused the angst so prevalent among priests as described in the articles by Father MacRae and Msgr. Guarino. It is naïve to think in these cases that a bishop’s first interest is going to be the priest. It really should not surprise us, however, that we are in this state. Just as seminarians are the product of the culture whence they come, and the Church must take pains to purify them of all that is wrong with the culture, so the Church, our bishops, are products of the culture in which the Church lives. We are living in the midst of the me-too movement, of the culture of ridiculous wokeness in which some believe five- and six-year-old children need to be educated about transgender ideology and sexual identity.
This dominant culture seeks rogue justice, not repentance. It seeks conformity, not diversity. We claim rights, not just the fulfillment of duties. We live in an age of wicked hypocrisy. Priests are labelled as dirty child molesters, not men of learning on a mission. Bishops steer the difficult course of confronting all that is evil in culture while trying not to make themselves and the Church irrelevant. But at what cost? With what methods?
Pandering to the mad mob is not the answer. Rather, we need to re-claim and re-publicize that the Gospel message is one of repentance and forgiveness and a call to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. We are bound to fall along the way, which is why the Second Person of the Trinity humbled Himself to be born of our human flesh. When we can regain our equilibrium after the scandals, we will be a much healthier Church, but less so if we simply discard those who have sinned but have embraced the grace of repentance. For now, as with so many other scandals and confusion in the Church, we ought as priests and laity to keep our heads down, say our prayers, and keep our Faith. This, too, shall pass. God knows when, but it will pass. How long, O Lord, how long?
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Fr. Stuart MacDonald, ordained in 1997, is a priest of the Diocese of St. Catharines, Canada. Pastor of a parish, he is currently a canon law doctoral candidate at St. Paul University in Ottawa and assists accused priests with canonical counsel. Previously, Fr. MacDonald studied canon law at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome and served as an official for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Most recently, he has been asked by Fr. MacRae to be the Canon Law Advisor for Beyond These Stone Walls.
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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: I thank Father Stuart for this candid and most important post on the state of priesthood in this troubled time. Both he and I want to urge readers to visit and ponder the posts cited herein by Msgr. Thomas G. Guarino in The Catholic World Report entitled, “The National Survey of Priests Suggests a Deep Crisis in Catholic Theology.”
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Father Stuart MacDonald, JCL at the Vatican
One of our Patron Saints, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, founded a religious site in his native Poland called Niepokalanow. The site has a real-time live feed of its Adoration Chapel with Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. We invite you to spend some time before the Lord in a place that holds great spiritual meaning for us.
Click or tap the image for live access to the Adoration Chapel.
As you can see the monstrance for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is most unusual. It is an irony that all of you can see it but I cannot. So please remember me while you are there. For an understanding of the theology behind this particular monstrance of the Immaculata, see my post “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”
The March for Life and the People on the Planet Next Door
The human fascination with finding extraterrestrial life has turned a blind eye to a half century of Roe v Wade. How would we explain Planned Parenthood to E.T.?
Courtesy of Damian Entwistle / CC BY-NC 2.0
The human fascination with finding extraterrestrial life has turned a blind eye to a half century of Roe v Wade. How would we explain Planned Parenthood to E.T.?
January 25, 2023 by Father Gordon MacRae
Note from Father Gordon MacRae: I first wrote this post six years ago in this same week in January 2017. It was written for an older version of this blog so we would have to restore it to make it readable again. I decided instead to rewrite it and publish it anew. This post is substantially revised and updated, but we retained the 2017 comments. Please feel free to add to them.
The annual March for Life took place this past week in the nation’s capital and around the country. It capped off a momentous year in the cause for life with the long-sought overturning of Roe v. Wade.
These events also coincide with a renewed interest in the scientific search for extraterrestrial life. The frenzy is fueled once again by grainy new images of something seen moving in the skies. Whatever it is, it is entirely of human origin for reasons explained in this post.
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Working in the prison law library a few days before a long holiday weekend in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr., I was trying to pick out a few books that might help me write a post for Beyond These Stone Walls during the long days stuck inside. I have to be really selective about books these days. I literally have to sleep with everything I’m reading. There is simply no place to put them but on my bunk. I’ll die if I can’t read and I’ll die if I can’t sleep. So I had to find a way to do both in the 60 square feet which I will never call home.
I knew there was a science post coming. I think Liz Feuerborn knew it, too. A dear friend and long time BTSW reader in Lincoln, Nebraska, Liz recently sent me a most welcomed Christmas gift. It’s a printed list of 244 Catholic priests and religious — four of them canonized saints — who have made major contributions to science. The list includes a description of the work of each.
I was very pleased to see among them another BTSW reader and contributor, Father Andrew Pinsent, a priest and particle physicist who has been a guest writer for this blog. Father Pinsent is the Research Director of the Ian Ramsey Center for Science and Religion at England’s Oxford University. I have written about him in a few posts, one of which he co-authored with me entitled, “Fr Georges Lemaître, the Priest Who Discovered the Big Bang.” The list of scientist-priests also includes Fr. Georges Lemaître, of course, a mathematician and physicist of the early 20th Century who is considered in scientific circles today to be the Father of Modern Cosmology. Ironically, he was also the godfather of Pornchai Moontri’s godfather. I am still trying to work out the astronomical odds against that.
Also on the list is Nicolaus Copernicus a priest and astronomer in the late 15th and early 16th Century who actually has a scientific revolution named after him. The Copernican Revolution knocked from the forefront of science the notion that our humble Earth is the center of our solar system. From my point of view, it has been a contribution to humankind’s capacity for humility that the Universe does not revolve around us. Alas, I am not on the list at all, but why would I be? I have no contribution to science except to be an observer. In that role, as I explain below, I have been in very good company.
But first, back to my selection of books for that long weekend stuck inside. The one that most caught my eye was the 2015 edition of the Guinness Book of World Records. It contains a few pages about scientific discoveries that have radically changed how we view our place in the Cosmos. A segment that got my attention was a small tribute to Vera Rubin, an American astronomer whose work led to the discovery of Dark Matter and Dark Energy, and changed the way science views the Universe.
Vera Rubin earned her doctorate in astronomy at Georgetown, a Catholic university in Washington, DC. In the 1960s and 1970s, her observations of other galaxies revealed that the velocity of the movement of stars in their outermost rims is much faster than the existing dogmas of science predicted. Her conclusions demonstrated that the Universe is much stranger than we had ever known, that the matter we actually can see in other galaxies comprises only five to ten percent of the actual Universe. The other ninety-five percent came to be known as dark matter and dark energy. “Astronomers thought they were studying the Universe,” she said, “and now we learn that we are just studying the five to ten percent that is luminous.”
Back at the start of 2017 I opened a copy of The Wall Street Journal and was stunned to see her obituary. Dr. Rubin died a week earlier on Christmas day at her home in Princeton, New Jersey. She was 88 years old, and one of the most accomplished astronomers of the late 20th Century. Much of what she discovered about the nature of the Universe and matter that we have been unable to see is now being demonstrated before our very eyes by a new and revolutionary telescope launched into distant orbit one million miles from Earth, a most important development that I described in 2022 in “The James Webb Space Telescope and an Encore from Hubble.”
Courtesy of Carnegie Institution of Washington and Smithsonian Air and Space Museum
Confounding the Scientific Theorists
Dr. Vera Rubin was awarded the National Medal of Science in 1993 for sparking “the realization that the Universe is more complex and more mysterious than had been imagined.” She shared several things in common with Father Georges Lemaître. One of them was the harsh reality that their proven research did not catch on right away. In his case, it was because he was a Catholic priest. In her case, it was because she was a woman. Dr. Rubin was predeceased by her daughter, Judy Young — also an accomplished astronomer — who died two years earlier in 2014. Vera Rubin wrote in 1995 that her role as a scientific observer “is to confound the theorists.” She will be confounding us for years to come.
At the limit of human knowledge just a century ago, the Universe consisted of just a single galaxy, the Milky Way, and astronomer Harlow Shapley demonstrated that our solar system was not at its center, but out on the galactic fringe in one of its spiral arms.
By the time of the Great Depression in the 1930s, astronomer Edwin Hubble discovered other galaxies while the Belgian priest and physicist, Fr Georges Lemaître, caused another scientific revolution with his mathematical equations, now supported by empirical science. He concluded that the Universe — all matter, space, and time — began “on a day without yesterday” from a primordial atom, later dubbed by a critic, “the Big Bang.”
Today, science reveals that there are trillions of galaxies, each containing hundreds of millions of stars, one of which is our sun. A recent issue of Popular Science magazine had a two-page spread that was another sort of epiphany for me. It was a depiction of a small segment of the Universe. The two page image contained 50,000 galaxies, and one tiny one was our Milky Way. From such an image, astrophysicist Mario Livio concludes, “From a purely physical perspective, we are just a speck of dust in the grand scheme of things.”
In just the last decade, it has been discovered that this one, unremarkable galaxy — one of trillions — contains about a billion planets orbiting its millions of stars. On December 5, 2011, the Kepler space telescope discovered the first known “Earth-like” exoplanet orbiting a star about 600 light years from Earth. It’s a distance of about 3,500 trillion miles.
The flurry of news and scientific speculation surrounding the discovery of other Earth-like exoplanets in orbit around distant stars handed science over to the theorists again. There was a presumption that life MUST have taken hold elsewhere, and that the planets MUST be host to one of the millions of civilizations like ours that MUST exist throughout the galaxy.
And of course the inevitable media target of the speculation is that religion, and most especially Christianity, MUST be made irrelevant when the aliens are finally found, or find us. The hope is that the discovery of E.T. will render obsolete 2,000 years of Western thought about God. As G.K. Chesterton put it, “Those who do not believe in God do not believe in nothing. They believe in anything!”
The story endured until the science media’s “next big thing”: The 2016 discovery of “Proxima B,” dubbed by the theorists to be “a potentially habitable Earth-like planet.” Orbiting Proxima Centauri, the star nearest to our sun, Proxima B is 4.2 light years away. It’s the planet next-door in galactic terms, about 25 trillion miles away. With current technology it would be a one-way journey of about 1,000 years or so.
In “If E.T. Phones Home, Make Sure It’s Collect” I laid out a series of reasons why I believe that Earth is the sole abode of intelligent life among the planets of this galaxy. For decades, the SETI Project — the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence — has used radio astronomy to listen for an electronic signature of extraterrestrial technology. Millions of stars and thousands of frequencies have been scanned and analyzed for over six decades, and the result has been nothing but silence.
The SETI project got a big boost in 2015. Russian billionaire, physicist and entrepreneur, Yuri Milner, invested $200 million into answering the basic question that so intrigues us. I wrote of this in “Yuri Milner’s $100 Million Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence.”
That article, published at LinkedIn, quotes a number of prominent scientists who were convinced that humanity is at the very threshold of the Earthshaking discovery of intelligent life elsewhere in the Cosmos. Two years into it, and the only available observation to confound the theorists is silence — nothing but silence. The hard truth is that science has produced far more empirical evidence of the spiritual benefit of talking to God — what everyone we know in the known Universe calls “prayer” — than talking to — or listening for — extraterrestrials.
Courtesy of David Daleiden
An American Horror Story
Don’t get me wrong. I have been fascinated and enthused about the science of SETI for my entire life. But until there is scientific observation with actual evidence, then there is only speculation and science fiction. Absent evidence, I have to conclude, like the astronomer and biologist John Gribben, that Earth is the sole abode of intelligent life among the billions of planets in this galaxy.
But if such a discovery is ever made, it would be monumental on every level known to humankind, and the discovery would be in two directions. If other intelligent life exists, then science must assume that E.T. is just as curious and driven to discover us as we are to learn of other life.
I wonder how we would explain the annual March for Life that takes place in Washington, DC and around the country. I wonder how we would account for the reason why tens of thousands of people of conscience — young and old alike — brave the DC winter each year to urge a reassessment of our cultural respect for human life. I wonder how we would explain why our news media virtually ignores the March for Life while hyping anything that places a Catholic or a Catholic conscience in a negative spotlight. Could we ever explain to an alien race the contradiction of our driven pursuit of life out there while we have so blindly squandered the right to life right here?
I just listened to a speech from our present “devoutly Catholic” President who spoke of his driven commitment to the rights, dignity, respect, and equality for all people while condemning the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision affirming the right to life of those not yet born. How would we explain to newly encountered intelligent life the weird enigma of our moral and scientific duplicity?
We humans are just as likely to be discovered BY other life in the Cosmos as we are to discover it. Every radio and television broadcast ever emitted on Earth is traveling at the speed of light in all directions through the vacuum of space.
This is what makes the American Horror Story of abortion without limits and its vast machine so horrible. It’s our blind duplicity.
If we keep at it, the only real evidence of intelligent life in the universe will be the fact that they wisely and silently keep their distance. If they exist at all, as so many in science seem driven to believe but with no evidence whatsoever, then this is as plausible an explanation for their silence as any other.
If E.T. gets wind of Planned Parenthood, we might well appear to be the neighbors from hell.
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Photo courtesy of Webb Space Telescope
Editor’s Note: You might like these other Prolife posts on Beyond These Stone Walls:
After Roe v. Wade, Hope for Life and a Nation’s Soul
The Unspoken Racist Arena of Roe v. Wade
Yuri Milner’s $100 Million Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence
If E.T. Phones Home, Make Sure It’s Collect
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The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights has released its 50-minute documentary film exposing “Walt’s Disenchanted Kingdom: How Disney Is Losing Its Way.” This film is a must-see for anyone concerned about the erosion of parental rights in the woke indoctrination of children. Watch the Catholic League documentary here.
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One of our Patron Saints, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, founded a religious site in his native Poland called Niepokalanowa. The site has a real-time live feed of its Adoration Chapel with Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. We invite you to spend some time before the Lord in a place that holds great spiritual meaning for us.
Click or tap the image for live access to the Adoration Chapel.
As you can see the monstrance for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is most unusual. It is an irony that all of you can see it but I cannot. So please remember me while you are there. For an understanding of the theology behind this particular monstrance of the Immaculata, see my post “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”
Disney’s Disenchanted Kingdom Versus Parental Rights
A Catholic League documentary film exposes the radical Disney descent into woke politics and child indoctrination and a flagrant disregard for parental rights.
Courtesy: the Catholic League
A Catholic League documentary film exposes the radical Disney descent into woke politics and child indoctrination and a flagrant disregard for parental rights.
January 18, 2023 by Fr. Gordon MacRae
Beyond These Stone Walls merited two citations in the “In the News” section of the December 2022 issue of Catalyst, the Journal of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights. Seeing this blog cited as a news source among venues like Catholic News Service, Catholic World Report, and Newsmax did little to bolster my New Year’s resolution to foster humility.
Also in that same issue of Catalyst, President Bill Donohue wrote about a documentary film produced by the Catholic League entitled, “Walt’s Disenchanted Kingdom: How Disney is Losing its Way.” In a brief but important article, “Why We Did the Disney Movie,” Bill Donohue laid out a compelling case for its necessity:
“Over the years, beginning in the 1990s, Disney turned against its family-friendly image, making and distributing fare that sharply broke with its moorings. I know this because one of the first big victories I had was in 1995 when I confronted Disney senior officials, ordering them out of the headquarters of the New York Archdiocese where we were located at that time. The occasion was the movie, “Priest,” a diabolical film that featured totally dysfunctional priests, all of whose problems were a function of their priesthood.”
The Catholic-bashing Disney film was distributed by Miramax, a company owned by Harvey Weinstein, now in prison for a series of sexual offenses. Then, according to Dr. Donohue, “Disney/Miramax did one anti-Catholic film after another.”
In March of 2022, Disney released a statement condemning a Florida bill that barred teaching students about sexual and gender identity issues from kindergarten to grade three. Governor Ron DeSantis signed the bill into law recognizing that parental rights are being disregarded when a media company takes on the parental role of sex education, especially when such content targets children ages five to eight. Who could possibly have objected to such a bill?
The Disney franchise did. At first its then-CEO, Bob Chapek, decided to steer clear of the controversy, but then he caved in under a barrage of pressure from Disney’s “woke” employees who dubbed Florida’s effort to protect parental rights as the “don’t say gay” bill. I wrote a multi-faceted post with a segment about this story that many also found shocking. Here are excerpts:
“Disney world has been in the news lately, but not for anything that contributes anything to the common good. In early 2022, following waves of parental anxiety over “woke” trends in education, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law a bill restricting schools from teaching about gender identity and sexual orientation from kindergarten to the third grade. In a bizarre twist for a corporation counting on Florida for success, Disney CEO Bob Chapek launched a corporate protest of the law.
“Supporters of the law said it was aimed at asserting more parental control over content in the classroom, a trend that swept the nation after a former Governor of Virginia declared last year that parents should have no say in what is taught in schools. The loudest reaction from parents has been revealed at the voting polls. Some of the most liberal school board members in some of the most liberal Democrat-led cities across the nation have since been voted out of office.”
Disney in La La Land
If you think the Florida law squashes legitimate debate about public policy, it does nothing of the kind. It simply limits classroom indoctrination about sexual and gender identity issues from kindergarten to grade three. This should need no defense. The law also requires that curriculum on these topics in subsequent grades must be age-appropriate. Governor DeSantis defended the new law amid an onslaught of “woke” protests:
“You’ve seen a lot of sloganeering and fake narratives by leftist politicians, by activists, and by corporate media. We will continue to recognize that in the state of Florida, parents have a fundamental role in the education, healthcare and well-being of their children.”
I wrote in another post that the Disney franchise was not always on board with its current woke agenda. Walt Disney himself went to an opposite extreme. One of my favorite movies as a child was the Disney production of Old Yeller which left an entire generation of children and teens in tears around 1960. Disney star, Tommy Kirk played a frontier teen forced to euthanize his beloved dog. Tommy Kirk went on to play the starring role in another Disney box office blockbuster, The Shaggy Dog, and again in Swiss Family Robinson.
On sets, Walt Disney introduced Tommy as “our moneymaker.” Then, at age 21, Kirk was seen holding hands at poolside with another teen boy. Walt Disney personally had him escorted off the set and his career with Disney came to an end. In his 20s, Kirk tried to revive his career with a few unmemorable productions, and then he read the writing on the wall. After recovering from addiction, he ran a small business in obscurity for most of his life and died in his 70s in 2020.
Walt Disney did not necessarily harbor prejudice. He simply knew that the public face of Disney’s entertainment empire should not also be the face of controversial social issues. So how would Walt Disney respond today to the spectacle that unfolded earlier last year in Florida?
A half century after Tommy Kirk was expelled from Disney, a reader sent me a message in 2022 suggesting that I should watch a made-for-TV Disney Film called “Under Wraps 2.” I did so with reluctance. The plot was both simple and simple-minded. A group of three middle school students discovered a pair of Egyptian mummies in a museum, assisted in bringing them back to life, attended a party with them, and then the movie ended with the kids jubilantly in the front row at a same-sex wedding which had nothing to do with the rest of the ridiculous plot.
It was clearly meant for indoctrination, and its message was also clear. If Corporate Disney could not foster such indoctrination in schools, it would do so on television, the next largest arena where impressionable children gather, often without parental awareness. In Disney’s contemporary films, the kids are portrayed as the only people who know what is going on while adults — especially parents — are portrayed as disconnected and generally clueless.
Tolerance, respect for human rights, and justice for all people are desirable goals for every society, but there is a gaping chasm between such a noble effort and the sweeping woke demands for schools to teach and promote LGBTQ and gender identity issues as a natural, even preferable evolution in human development that contributes to the common good. The “common good” is the most abused and debatable part of this discussion. I once wrote a post on the special handling of presenting this subject as normative. It was an eye-opener for many entitled, “Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and the Homosexual Matrix.”
In its public opposition to a common sense law, Corporate Disney descended into La La Land and is out of touch with the currents of parental rights and responsibilities. Disney’s dive into the culture war should raise alarms for stockholders whose concerns for Disney’s bottom line might dwarf its woke agenda. It should also raise alarms for parents whose children are lured from parental influence by sexual indoctrination made enticing to children by mixing it with heavy doses of glitter and fun.
Courtesy: the Catholic League
Waking up the Woke
Disney Chief Executive Bob Chapek initiated a public dispute with Governor DeSantis over Florida's common sense measure. Mr. Chapek and Disney World were on the wrong side of public policy and parental rights in this. The Walt Disney franchise can only be harmed by this oblivious descent into suppressing parental rights. I predicted such a development in another post, “The ‘Woke’ Have Commenced Our Totalitarian Re-Education .”
Former long term Disney CEO Bob Iger, frustrated at the lack of response to the new Florida bill, tweeted, “If passed, this bill will put vulnerable young LGBTQ people in jeopardy.” Was Mr. Iger referring to LGBTQ kindergarten students? The absurdity of the statement was left dangling. According to an extended article on the Disney debacle in The Wall Street Journal (Disney Endgame Dec. 17-18, 2022) Mr. Iger had embraced Disney’s drift into progressive politics more than his successor. The tweet caused Mr. Chapek to change course and refute the Florida Bill.
The resultant public controversy took a toll on the Disney bottom line. By September 2021, the company had lost 45% of its stock value, but its corporate responsibility to shareholders became subordinate to what the WSJ described as “the company’s support of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender causes.”
In response to all this, Bill Donohue recruited the interest of Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council. Together they sought a meeting with Disney CEO Bob Chapek who ignored them. In the Catholic League documentary, former Disney writers reveal how the modern Disney franchise sexualizes children including “a history of exposing its young actors ... to grooming with gay and transgender messaging.” Disney's latest animated film, “Strange World,” depicts “the first openly gay teen romance in a children's movie.”
Of interest, one of the global moneymakers in the Disney franchise is Disney Shanghai. With close friends in Shanghai, I have photographs of their family outing at this newest and sprawling Disney theme park. Disney is careful not to let the same woke value judgments invade Shanghai because the Chinese Communist Party would not tolerate it. As Bill Donohue points out, Disney will accommodate China while ignoring polls in the U.S. revealing that “seventy-five percent of American voters say that targeting underage minors in a transgender movement has gone too far.”
In recent developments, CEO Bob Chapek has been fired by the Disney Board of Directors while former CEO Bob Iger has returned for another stint as Disney CEO. Disney’s stock valuation had taken a major hit. A recent extended article in The Wall Street Journal explores these developments at Disney but hints that its returning CEO leans even further left than Chapek. This does not bode well for navigating the company out of the quagmire of one-sided progressive politics into which it has descended.
Check the Catholic League website for information on the release of “Walt’s Disenchanted Kingdom” and a trailer. The documentary features prominent cultural and media commentators including Director Jason Meath, Dr. Bill Donohue, Tony Perkins, Mercedes Schlapp, Dr. Ben Carson, Miranda Devine, Brent Bozell, David Horowitz, and Washington Times Film Critic, Christian Toto.
I wonder what the late Tommy Kirk might think today about the Disney drift to the opposite extreme of LGBTQ concerns. One need not travel back more than a few decades to find a parade of young actors used, used up and discarded by Corporate Disney. Remember Bobby Driscoll? He found stardom as Jim Hawkins in the 1950s blockbuster Disney production of Treasure Island. Bobby died from drug addiction in his early thirties after spending much of his youth anonymously discarded on skid row.
“What father among you would hand his son a stone if he asks for a fish?” (Matthew 7:10). What parent among you would take a cue from Disney on the education and raising of your child?
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The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights has released its 50-minute documentary film exposing “Walt’s Disenchanted Kingdom: How Disney Is Losing Its Way.” This film is a must-see for anyone concerned about the erosion of parental rights in the woke indoctrination of children. Watch the Catholic League documentary here.
Editor’s Note: The December 2022 issue of the Catholic League Journal, Catalyst also profiles and recommends a new book by Stephen Krason, a member of the Catholic League Board of advisors who teaches political science at Franciscan University. His book gathers a stellar group of scholars who address, Parental Rights in Peril published by Catholic University Press.
Thank you for reading and sharing this important post. You may also like these related posts from Fr. Gordon MacRae at Beyond These Stone Walls:
The “Woke” Have Commenced Our Totalitarian Re-Education
Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and the Homosexual Matrix
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One of our Patron Saints, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, founded a religious site in his native Poland called Niepokalanowa. The site has a real-time live feed of its Adoration Chapel with Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. We invite you to spend some some time before the Lord in a place that holds great spiritual meaning for us.
Click or tap here to proceed to the Adoration Chapel.
As you can see the monstrance for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is most unusual. It is an irony that all of you can see it but I cannot. So please remember me while you are there. For an understanding of the theology behind this particular monstrance of the Immaculata, see my post “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”
Priests in Crisis: The Catholic University of America Study
While some high-profile priests are maligned from both in and beyond the Church, The Catholic University of America published its National Study of Catholic Priests.
While some high-profile priests are maligned from both in and beyond the Church, The Catholic University of America published its National Study of Catholic Priests.
“You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles?”
— Matthew 7:16
January 11, 2023 by Fr. Gordon MacRae
In 2005, Catholic League President Bill Donohue was interviewed on the NBC Today show about accusations of sexual abuse by Catholic priests — some sadly true, but some also sadly false. Citing the case against me as an example, he said, “There is no segment of the American population with less civil liberties protection than the average American Catholic priest.”
Catholic priests in the United States have long been under assault from the news media, from activist groups, and at times even from within the Church. As most readers know, I have been the subject of many published articles, but not because I have been accused. It is because I strenuously refute the accusations as false. Much evidence has amassed in support of that. For some reason, this poses a threat to some nefarious agendas built around the sex abuse crisis in the Church.
When accused priests defend themselves in online media, seeding articles with vile comments using fake screen names had long been a tactic of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, an organization that sought not so much to support legitimate victims, but to maximize monetary awards and media condemnation. Its representatives terrorized Church officials with media manipulation whenever any accused priest is defended in the court of public opinion.
Despite all that, some standout news media have bravely produced articles and commentary against the tide of public vitriol about accused priests. The Wall Street Journal recently published its fourth such article about the case against me. The most recent was by Boston Attorney Harvey Silverglate entitled “Justice Delayed for Father MacRae.” This generated some excellent analysis by David F. Pierre, Jr. moderator of The Media Report. Those and other articles appear in our featured section, The Wall Street Journal.
I have much gratitude for Dorothy Rabinowitz, Harvey Silverglate, Ryan MacDonald, Bill Donohue, and David F. Pierre, Jr. for their valiant efforts to correct the public record. Without their truthful courage, I was at the mercy of nefarious means driven mostly by progressive political agendas and litigious greed. Most recently, however, even some bold Catholic writers have taken up the subject of Catholic Priests Falsely Accused.
The National Study of Catholic Priests
When I was first accused, my bishop and diocese published a press release declaring, without evidence, that I victimized not only my accusers, but the entire Catholic Church. That bishop’s successor later went on record to state his informed belief that I am innocent and should never have been in prison. Then his successor chose only to shun me, and to release my name on a public list of the “credibly” accused. He did this, he stated, for “transparency,” but that transparency has been highly selective.
My own experience leaves me with no trust at all that my bishop could, or would even try, to discern guilt from false witness in defense of me or any accused priest. Trust and distrust as the fallout from the scandal are now central issues in a recently published survey of 10,000 U.S. priests sponsored by The Catholic Project at The Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. I highly recommend reviewing a report on the study results entitled, “The National Study of Catholic Priests: A Time of Crisis.” It was the largest study on the state of the priesthood in fifty years. Here is an overview of its parameters:
“Over the last two decades, the clergy sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic Church has significantly eroded the trust between laity and clergy... Since the earliest days of the Dallas Charter there have been concerns that the bishops’ understandable eagerness to crack down on abusive priests was coming at the expense of due process protections for the accused: a de facto policy of ‘guilty until proven innocent.’ These concerns have been exacerbated by an expansion in the scope of the Church’s anti-abuse policies coupled with a perceived double standard in the way allegations against bishops have been handled in comparison to priests.”
Father Roger Landry, a columnist for the National Catholic Register, has an excellent analysis of The Catholic University of America study entitled, “Repairing the Relationship Between Priests and Bishops.”
The findings of the study are based on the responses of the thousands of U.S. priests who participated and submitted completed surveys. Given the difficult period of the last 20 years since the U.S. Bishops’ Dallas Charter was enacted, some of these responses are surprising, and point to the depth of commitment, spiritual life, optimism and resiliency of most priests. Most priests reported a high level of satisfaction in their ministry. A stunning 77% of priests self-reported that they are flourishing in their vocation.
Among the results, however, are some big red flags: 82% of priests report living with a fear of being falsely accused and left with no defense; 45% of priests report that they experience at least one symptom of ministry burnout, while 9% described their level of burnout as severe, and characterized by high levels of stress and emotional and physical exhaustion. Reports of high stress came particularly from younger priests. (I will get back to this later) .
The biggest concern among priests is related to the toll and fallout of the U.S. Bishops’ collective response to the sex abuse crisis in the Church. The sense of vulnerability among priests and their trust level for their bishops are the two most significant areas of negative fallout from the crisis.
In his NC Register column linked above, Father Roger Landry points to what I have called a disaster in the relationship between bishops and priests: the drafting and enactment of the 2002 “Dallas Charter” which imposed a draconian standard of “zero tolerance” and one-strike-and-you’re-out in response to any “credible” accusation against a priest. For an analysis of this standard of evidence, see my post, “The Credibility of Bishops on Credibly Accused Priests.”
Father Landry reports that the drafting of these policies in 2002 was done “hurriedly and under enormous pressure from the press, lawsuits and furious faithful.” Priests in the current study actually appreciated the efforts to respond to the crisis openly and with transparency. “But the priests surveyed gave stark testimony to the harms that have come from what the bishops in Dallas left out of balance.”
Guilty for Being Accused
The Vatican and Catholic hierarchy were unfairly maligned throughout publicity on “The Scandal.” At one point, SNAP partnered with the far-left, New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights to bring a crimes-against-humanity charge against Pope Benedict XVI at the International Criminal Court at the Hague. Some of the false claims against me were employed to shame Pope Benedict on a global scale. The scheme was nothing more than a publicity stunt to embarrass the Church into maximizing financial settlements. Many of its claims, including those against me were exposed as a fraud. Journalist Joann Wypijewski exposed this story in “Oscar Hangover Special: Why “Spotlight” Is a Terrible Film.”
Only in the Catholic Church is the highest echelon of governance blamed for the lowest level of misbehavior. Even in his later years, Benedict was demonized by German Catholics and others eager for any reason to blame him for the abuses of the past. Of interest, in the State of New Hampshire where I live more than 900 men between the ages of 20 and 50 have open lawsuits alleging systemic sexual abuse by State agents in the State’s juvenile detention facilities. Not one media outlet, not one victim group, not one of the victims themselves has blamed any of this on any present or former governor. This State carried out a witch-hunt in 2002 when the accused were Catholic priests. It is now confirmed that simultaneous to the witch-hunt was an active cover-up of the malfeasance of State agents.
As stated above, 82% of priests now report that they feel vulnerable to false accusations of sexual abuse that under existing policy will summarily end their ministry without due process. Compounding this fear, many report that they would be treated as guilty and left without support unless they could prove their innocence. Sixty-four percent said they would be left without support or resources to mount a defense, and almost half, 49%, think they would not be supported by their bishop. Father Landry added a sobering understanding of the reality:
“In most dioceses, when a priest is accused, he loses his home, his job, his good name — all within hours. He is removed immediately from his rectory and parish assignment, prevented from public ministry for the length of what is often an inexcusably glacial investigation, and required to dress like a layman. A press release is published in which the priest’s reputation is injured, if not ruined. He needs to exhaust his meager savings or beg and borrow money to hire a lawyer. Most excruciatingly, he has to linger for months or years under suspicion of being a sadistic pervert as well as a hypocrite to the faith for which he has given his life.”
Given the reality that most claims against priests are many years or decades old, establishing clear evidence is difficult if not impossible. So the bishops adopted what they called the “credible” standard. It means only that if a priest and an accuser lived in the same parish or community 20, 30, or 40 years ago, the accusation is “credible” on its face. No one in America but a Catholic priest could lose his livelihood, his reputation, sometimes even his freedom, under such a standard. I exposed one such case in “The Exile of Father Dominic Menna and Transparency at The Boston Globe.”
I am most appreciative to Father Roger Landry and the National Catholic Register for their bold and transparent analysis of what actually happens to an accused priest. By taking all the steps a diocese or bishop imposes above, such a priest is effectually silenced and unable to defend himself at all.
Stress along the fault lines between bishops and priests that these policies have caused is also clear in the survey. There is a wide disparity between how bishops view themselves and how they are viewed by their priests. Seventy-three percent of bishops reported viewing priests as their brothers. Only 28% of priests reported that their bishops treat them that way.
The disconnect revealed itself in several other ways as well: 70% of bishops reported that they are spiritual fathers to their priests while only 28% of priests thought the same. Father Landry reported that the biggest disconnect relates to a priest who is struggling. Ninety-percent of bishops reported that they would be present to and supportive of a struggling priest while only 36% of priests thought that this is true.
The Double Standard
Also evident in both the survey and Father Landry’s analysis of it is the double standard created when bishops failed to hold themselves accountable to the same standards imposed on their priests. In 2002, as the Charter was being debated during the U.S. Bishops Conference at Dallas, Cardinal Avery Dulles published a landmark article in America magazine entitled “The Rights of Accused Priests.”
The article was cheered by priests but largely ignored by bishops. Cardinal Dulles cited a 2000 pastoral initiative of the U.S. bishops entitled “Responsibility and Rehabilitation.” It criticized the U.S. justice system for the establishment of one-size-fits-all norms such as “zero tolerance” and “one strike and you’re out.” Then the same bishops, in a media panic, imposed those same standards on their priests.
But none of it ever applied to accusations against bishops, a reality that Father Landry described as “a double standard that profoundly affected their relationship [with priests].” While deliberating adoption of the Dallas Charter, the bishops removed the word “cleric,” which could have included bishops, and replaced it with “priests and deacons.” Now 51% of priests report that they do not have confidence in their bishop while 70% report a lack of confidence in bishops in general.
In a 2019 apostolic letter, Vos Estis Lux Mundi, Pope Francis addressed some of the disparities with mixed results. Father Landry points out that investigations of bishops, even in allegations of past sexual abuse, “seldom involve the draconian measures experienced by priests.”
I have written of a glaring example in my own diocese. Citing a desire for “transparency,” and with no one pressuring him to do so, my bishop proactively published in 2019 a list of the names and status of 73 priests of this diocese who had been “credibly” accused over fifty years. Most are deceased. Weeks later, a New Hampshire Superior Court judge barred publication of information from a grand jury investigation which was the source for most of the Bishop’s list. Ryan MacDonald wrote of the reasons for that in “Our Bishops Have Inflicted Grave Harm On the Priesthood.”
Months after publishing his list, my bishop was himself accused in a civil lawsuit in the Diocese of Rockville Center, New York. He was unjustly caught up in the political fallout of former New york Governor Andrew Cuomo who generated the claims when he signed into law an exemption window in which old time-barred accusations can be brought forward after the statute of limitations had run. I defended my bishop in a widely read post, “Bishop Peter A. Libasci Was Set Up by Governor Andrew Cuomo.”
Conservative Priests Face Greater Scrutiny
I mentioned above that I would revisit one finding of this report — that younger priests experience more stress than older priests. A separate research report on Catholic priests by the Austin Institute has documented that younger priests tend to be more conservative and traditional than older priests. That bears out from observations of our readers who find this distinction to be a positive development. Writing for The Wall Street Journal, Vatican Correspondent Francis X. Rocca reported on this in “Catholic Ideological Split Widens” (Dec.19, 2022):
“U.S. Catholic bishops elected conservative leaders last month, continuing to resist a push from Pope Francis to put issues such as climate change and poverty on par with the bishops’ declared priority of opposing abortion.”
The bishops appointed by Pope Francis tend to mirror his priorities. His recent elevation of San Diego Archbishop Robert McElroy, a leading liberal among U.S. bishops, to the College of Cardinals is an example. There is thus a growing disparity in liberal vs. conservative views as newly appointed bishops are more liberal while priests newly emerging from U.S. seminaries are more conservative and traditional.
Since the 1980s, successive annual ordinations have grown more conservative. Each successive 10-year grouping in the ordained priesthood supports Church teaching on moral and theological issues more strongly than the one before it. Those ordained after 2010, as a whole, are most conservative. When seminarians and younger priests do not have their views of the Church and Catholic practice affirmed, stress develops and increases. Younger U.S. priests represent a generation disillusioned with ideas of progress and religious pluralism, and the abandonment of the Church’s prolife charism in favor of topics like climate change.
This leaves a widening chasm between Pope Francis, his Episcopal appointments, and younger priests in the United States. The Catholic Project study also reveals that almost 80% of priests ordained before 1980 approve strongly of Pope Francis while only 20% of those ordained after 2010 share that view. Is their priestly interest in respect for tradition a plague upon the Church?
Or is it the whispering of the Holy Spirit?
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Note from Father Gordon MacRae: This brief essay from American Thinker by Attorney Franklin Friday is perhaps the best commentary on the future Church after the death of Pope Benedict XVI, and not only because I am in it. Please read and share this timely article: No Easy Road for Men of God.
You may also be interested in these related posts from Beyond These Stone Walls:
The Once and Future Catholic Church
Forty Years of Priesthood in the Mighty Wind of Pentecost
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One of our Patron Saints, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, founded a religious site in his native Poland called Niepokalanowa. The site has a real-time live feed of its Adoration Chapel with Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. We invite you to spend some some time before the Lord in a place that holds great spiritual meaning for us.
Click or tap the image for live access to the Adoration Chapel.
As you can see the monstrance for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is most unusual. It is an irony that all of you can see it but I cannot. So please remember me while you are there. For an understanding of the theology behind this particular monstrance of the Immaculata, see my post “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”
Pope Francis, Fr. Frank Pavone and the End of Roe v. Wade
Catholics were shocked by news that Pope Francis signed a decree dismissing Fr. Frank Pavone from the priesthood just months after the reversal of Roe v. Wade.
Catholics were shocked by news that Pope Francis signed a decree dismissing Fr. Frank Pavone from the priesthood just months after the reversal of Roe v. Wade.
January 4, 2023 by Fr. Gordon MacRae
As most readers of this post already know, I write as a priest in prison where I have spent the last 29 years in unjust confinement. In more recent years, much evidence has surfaced that I was wrongfully convicted, and that evidence has been repeatedly covered by a secular global media venue, The Wall Street Journal. Because I write for a blog with a global readership, others both here in my prison and beyond have come to see that faith is a better path to true freedom than any other. Priesthood, even in confinement, is meant to be lived in a state of sacrificial fatherhood.
Now I wonder how my stubborn clinging to something under such public assault as Catholic priesthood might be seen in the light of recent revelations about Pope Francis and the ever-growing reality of “cancelled priests” to which he seems to have lent the power of his pen. News of the dismissal from the priesthood of Father Frank Pavone, the most respected, outspoken, and visible prolife priest in North America, cast a good part of the Catholic prolife world back into the land of gloom just before Christmas. That drama continues with lots of finger-pointing.
As I ponder this troubling development, my own finger keeps turning like a compass needle to a possible causal connection. Midway through 2022 I wrote, “After Roe v. Wade, Hope for Life and a Nation’s Soul.” The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights sent that post to all its thousands of members asking them to read and share it. The U.S. Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade cast much of this nation into political turmoil. It generated on the political left waves of threatened reprisals against Catholic churches, prolife Catholics, and the entire prolife movement. Did reprisals come from within the Church as well?
My internal compass cannot help but notice that only five months later, the most visibly prolife Catholic priest in America was removed from the priesthood ostensibly for behaviors that ordinarily would not have resulted in such a penalty. Fr. Pavone and others with internal knowledge of this bombshell have insinuated that activist progressive bishops brought pressure to bear. If this is true, and evidence surfaces to support this claim, it would be a scandal of immense proportions for the prolife cause and for the Church.
There are some that would readily imagine political payback as the true heart of this decision. Others see it as an unjust punishment imposed for reasons more secular and political than ecclesial. In his homily to priests on his apostolic visit to the United States in Philadelphia in 1979, Pope John Paul II articulated the indelible character of the priestly vocation: “It cannot be that God who gave the impulse to say ‘yes’ now wishes to hear ‘no.’”
We are not owed explanations of the Pope’s deliberations so we may never have an adequate explanation of this. But I cannot forget the last words published by Father Richard John Neuhaus about my own situation. The late Father Neuhaus was one of the premier theologians and observers of Catholic culture in the Church in North America. In “A Kafkaesque Tale” in First Things magazine (August-September 2008) he wrote of my imprisonment:
“You may want to pray for Father MacRae and for a Church and a justice system that seem indifferent to justice.”
We must now pray as well for Father Frank Pavone and all who were involved in bringing about his separation from priesthood. The Church must not seem indifferent to justice. The timing of this matter could not have been worse for prolife Catholics who sacrificed much over many years working toward a conscience-driven judicial reversal of Roe v. Wade even as many in the Catholic hierarchy set it aside in favor of other moral priorities such as climate change.
Absent any other explanation for Father Pavone’s dismissal, many are left to conclude something nefarious. There is no shortage of demonic attack on the champions of the Catholic prolife movement. I alluded to this in a paragraph in my recent post, “Joseph’s Dream and the Birth of the Messiah”:
“Our culture’s turning away from life is also a turning away from God. The fact that many nominally Catholic politicians lend their voices and votes to that turning away is a betrayal of Biblical proportions. In the Story of God and human beings, we have been here before. Planned Parenthood is our culture’s Temple to Baal.”
Double Standards
I have, in the past, expressed concerns about the fervent witness of high-profile outspoken priests like Fr. Frank Pavone and Fr. James Altman. I have written of my belief that their message might be more effective with some toning down of their rhetoric. Some readers reminded me that Jesus Himself did not seem to think so when he drove the money-changers out of the Temple (Mark 11:15). So, to borrow a phrase from Pope Francis himself, “Who am I to judge?”
Still, I have witnessed Father Pavone react to this latest news with an aura of both written and verbal apparent disrespect for Church authority. His anger is suspect, but the absence of any anger would be much more suspect. Would priesthood mean so little to him that being discarded should be met with calm acquiescence?
I recently received a letter from a priest in which he wrote, “I understand that you have a problem with Pope Francis. Perhaps you just don’t understand him.” I asked the priest what gave him that impression. In response, he referred to a post of mine entitled, “Pope Francis in a Time of Heresy.” It is but one of many posts I have written about Pope Francis. None were disrespectful.
However, the priest who wrote to me had not read anything beyond the title before concluding that I have a problem with Pope Francis and therefore use this blog to rebel. That could not be further from the truth. The “heresy” described in that post was not that of Pope Francis at all. It rather challenged the many self-described traditional and conservative Catholics who openly charged that any question of divorce, remarriage, and Communion cheapens the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony and undermines it.
True or not, those same Catholics had little or nothing to say when it was the Sacrament of Holy Orders that came under assault in 2002 and remains so. The “heresy” post ended up holding the record for being shared on social media (over 25,000 times on Facebook alone) only because many who thought it accused Pope Francis of heresy never actually read it.
After news of Father Pavone’s dismissal from priesthood, one of our readers referred to Pope Francis in a comment as “the fake pope.” Like Elon Musk (but with none of his resources) I much prefer to let people speak their minds, but I asked to have the word “fake” removed before posting that comment. Francis is the legitimate successor of the Chair of Peter. As priests, both Father Pavone and I owe allegiance and fidelity to his office. Sometimes exercising that fidelity means also writing and speaking the truth. I am committed to doing so without anger or insult.
However, many readers of this blog have commented that a clear double standard exists in the discipline of priests. It is widely believed that conservative and traditional priests are treated with more oversight and disdain from hierarchy than so-called progressive clerics. Many cite Fr. James Martin who openly challenges and even disregards Catholic moral teaching on sexual and gender issues, and some of the German bishops who defied Pope Francis by the blessing of same-sex unions.
None have received any penalty, much less the nuclear bomb dropped on Father Pavone and Priests for Life. The U.S. Bishops Conference had an opportunity, supported by many bishops, to address with pro-abortion Catholic politicians the dichotomy between what they profess as Catholics and what they practice in regard to the right to life. A few bishops took a courageous stance. Most voted against it, and the matter was left to dangle unaddressed. I wrote of this double standard in “Biden and the Bishops: Communion and the Care of a Soul.”
Because the subject, and that post, surfaced just months before a presidential election in 2020, the topic was largely suppressed in the media, a trend that now has a familiar ring. Suppressed as well is the fact that Pope Francis has himself made many bold statements in support of the prolife cause while his climate change statements are widely disseminated in the media. Given this, one would hope that he would be conscious of double standards and their effect on clergy and laity alike.
A Bombshell for So Many Catholics
As I was preparing to write this post, a reader sent me a recording from the popular radio show, “Catholic Drive Time with Joe McClane.” The episode was devoted to news of Fr. Frank Pavone’s dismissal, and Pavone himself was a call-in guest of the show. Joe McClane referred to the dismissal as “a bombshell for so many Catholics.”
Father Pavone was asked to respond to the matter, and said with some sarcasm, “What took them so long?” I expect him to be angry and disappointed, but I do not think sarcasm serves his cause. One concerned priest and canon lawyer observed this as well, and told me that Father Pavone may not be entirely innocent in all this. I recall a similar discussion with a reader who defended former police officer Derek Chauvin who brought about the death of George Floyd in 2020. He stated that Floyd tried to pass a fake $20 bill. True or not, no one in America is executed over a fake $20 bill.
Also appearing on the same show was Father Gerald Murray, JCD, a well-known canon lawyer in the Archdiocese of New York who appears frequently as part of “The Papal Posse” on EWTN’s The World Over with Raymond Arroyo. I have much respect for Father Murray and his canonical expertise. He pointed out that the charges against Father Pavone are two-fold: blasphemy in Internet postings and persistent disobedience to his bishop.
The charges were adjudicated by the Vatican Congregation for Clergy at the behest of the Bishop of Amarillo, Texas, Father Pavone’s bishop. Father Pavone was then judged to be guilty of both offenses. However, neither of those offenses, even if found to be true, generally result in a canonical dismissal from the clerical state according to Father Murray who added that punishment for those offenses went beyond what is prescribed in Canon Law. Father Pavone’s bishop may have requested removal. Until a formal decree is issued, no one seems to know how this dismissal came about, according to Father Murray.
To his credit, Father Pavone went on to explain that he has laid out his defense against the charges on his personal website, FrFrankPavone.com. I am told that there is a lot there to read, and I encourage readers with concerns about this matter to peruse that site.
In his Catholic Drive Time radio interview, Father Pavone concluded, “I urge everyone to respect authority in the Church, but I do not respect abuse of authority.” He did not place blame directly with Pope Francis for his dismissal, but with “certain bishops” who “lie, block and obstruct to control the kind of prolife message” the Church will hear.” He cited as an example of the abuse of process that he learned of his dismissal from Catholic News Agency instead of from his own bishop.
Priests for Life
The high-profile case of Father Pavone has now resulted in a high-profile reaction, some of it marked by obvious anger. The Coalition for Canceled Priests issued a statement from Sister Dede Byrne who found national prominence when she was invited to address the Republic National Convention before the 2020 presidential election where she advocated strongly for rights and protections for the unborn. Here is a segment of her public response to the laicization of Father Frank Pavone:
“The most vocal prolife priest has been laicized! What crime has he done to warrant such a harsh punishment? In the wake of this travesty, we still have the most pro-death, anti-nuclear family president in our nation’s history who professes to be a Catholic in good standing ... with no real guidance from our bishops or the Vatican ... What appears to many Catholics who love our Church is selective mercy from the Pope of Mercy. I ask myself, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on Earth?” (Luke 18:7)
Sister Dede Byrne touched upon what should be a grave concern for every priest. What happened to Father Pavone likely would not have happened just a decade ago. Another canon lawyer explained to me that under a 21st-Century papal decree, bishops obtained the authority to seek a priest’s removal from ministry and even formal dismissal from the clerical state without a penal process. Some have come to see this as the Church’s own version of capital punishment. More frequent use of this development should cause concern for every priest and lay Catholic. Such a process invites abuse and the application of bias against what a bishop might perceive as ideologically undesirable clergy.
The message sent by Pope Francis is that he is on board with such a cause. I wonder if he fully knows the deep sadness and disillusionment now thrust upon priests, the faithful, and especially the prolife cause in this dichotomy. The Pope who assumed the Chair of Peter and launched the Year of Mercy in his papacy appears to have abandoned all mercy for priests.
I have not been dismissed from priesthood. I hope and pray that such an injustice never befalls me. Father Frank Pavone and I have only the grace of fortitude. I never knew I had it until recently. It is defined as “Strength of mind that allows one to endure pain or adversity with courage.” We could both simply abandon the Church and be free of all scrutiny and betrayal, but the grace of fortitude stands in the way. I thank God for that.
An appeal of this dismal is not possible because the outcome already bears the signature of the highest authority in the Church. In 2002, however, Saint John Paul II reminded bishops that they should not lose sight of the power of prayer and conversion in the life of a priest. The Pope is also a priest and he can reconsider his own conclusions. Pope Francis and Father Frank Pavone are both priests for life. Please pray for them in these difficult days for the priesthood. Above all, pray for justice. The Church and priesthood are much diminished without it.
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Note from Fr. Gordon MacRae: Writing for The Catholic Thing, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Ph.D, STD, has written perhaps the most pointed analysis in print on this matter: “Fr. Pavone and “The Spirit of Vatican I.”
Thank you for reading and sharing this week’s post. You may also like these related posts from Beyond These Stone Walls:
The Duty of a Priest: Father Frank Pavone and Priests for Life
Pope Francis in a Time of Heresy
Will Pope Francis Stand Against Catholic Schism?
Biden and the Bishops: Communion and the Care of a Soul
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Photo courtesy of Vatican Media
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One of our Patron Saints, Saint Maximilian Kolbe, founded a religious site in his native Poland called Niepokalanowa. Today the Chapel has a real-time live feed for a most beautiful adoration chapel where people around the world can spend time in Eucharistic Adoration. We invite you to come and spend some quiet time adoring our Lord.
Click or tap the image for live access to the Adoration Chapel.
As you can see the monstrance for Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament is most unusual. It is an irony that all of you can see it but I cannot. So please remember me while you are there. For an understanding of the theology behind this particular monstrance of the Immaculata, see my post “The Ark of the Covenant and the Mother of God.”