Tag: Catholics

Wheeling WV cathedral rector has to testify in Phila. abuse case

A Wheeling WV judge says an aide to the Wheeling bishop must appear in the criminal trial of two Philadelphia priests.

A West Virginia judge has ordered a Catholic church official formerly from Philadelphia to testify at the clergy sex-abuse trial now under way in the city.

The ruling late Thursday by Ohio County Circuit Judge Ronald E. Wilson ends a weeklong stalemate over testimony by Msgr. Kevin Michael Quirk.

Quirk served as a judge in the the 2008 church trial of one of the defendants, Rev. James J. Brennan, in which Philadelphia prosecutors say Brennan made “inculpatory” statements usable against him.

Brennan is charged with attempted rape of a 14-year-old boy in 1996. Prosecutors seek corroborating testimony from Quirk, who objected to his being required to testify. But the Wheeling judge ruled Quirk a material witness and said his testimony in Philadelphia “is essential in ascertaining the truth.” He ordered Quirk to appear in Philadelphia when requested between April 29 and May 1.

A decided wrinkle to the contest over requiring Quirk to testify is that in the Philadelphia trial a witness has implicated Quirk’s boss, Bishop Michael Bransfield of Wheeling, accusing him of sexual abuse, which Bransfield has denied.

St. Pius X Catholics will return to a struggle

SSPX Mass in St. Jude's Church, Philadelphia.
SSPX Mass in St. Jude's Church, Philadelphia. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) The way things used to be.

Natl Catholic Register’s Pat Archbold welcomes the Society of St. Pius X people’s expected return from the wilderness of papal interdict, but sees no promise of a rose garden in that return:

Bringing the SSPX back into the fold is a great thing for the souls involved and I think that they will help be an example to others. But their integration will be very painful, very. So if this really happens as it appears it will, let us rejoice. But let us also be realistic. The gates of hell will never prevail, we have the Lord’s promise on that. But in the meantime, things may even get worse before they get better. But at least now we will have some really good people bearing it with us.

He refers to those returning, and they would rightly scoff at the wilderness motif. Rather, it’s a return to the big, bad world of what Archbold neatly terms 1965-2012 Catholicism. I have heard their priests (not all) rail against the contemporary church, more often in support of strict practice in faith and morals and liturgical practice.

They and their flock are not going gentle into that good night, as they see it, of this era. But they are third-generation pre-1965 Catholics, firm in all they espouse, and will more likely rage against the dying of the light, as they see it, of this era. Catholics will continue to live in interesting times.

More: At the same time, keep in mind that the SSPX leadership calls this “a stage and not a conclusion” of return.  Which they would, of course.

 

Wheeling WV Bishop accused, his cathedral rector balking at giving testimony

 

Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment
Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Wheeling Intelligencer presents the Bishop Bransfield story, earlier part of a Phila. Inquirer story, in the starkest of terms:

PHILADELPHIA- A man testified Wednesday in a clergy abuse trial that a priest raped him in the 1970s at a beach house owned by the Most Rev. Michael J. Bransfield and that he was told that Bransfield, who currently serves as bishop of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston, also sexually abused a boy.

The 48-year-old man also testified that he saw Bransfield with a car full of boys at a farm owned by his accused abuser, the Rev. Stanley Gana. The witness said that Gana told him Bransfield was having sex with the boy who was in the front seat.

Another man has testified that Bransfield had a lewd conversation with him.

The testimony came at the trial of the Rev. James Brennan, who’s accused in a 1996 child-sex assault.

Bransfield has not been charged, nor has he ever been charged, the Intelligencer reports. Nor accused, as far as a monitoring of his history on the Internet can tell us.

The Wheeling diocese is withholding comment until “the facts and issues surrounding this testimony are made fully known to the Diocese,” except to urge Catholics “to remember all victims of sexual abuse and to pray for them and their families” and to dismiss the trial itself as a “circus” and part of a smear campaign by prosecutors.

“They seem to want to bludgeon witnesses, smear individuals not on trial, anything to bolster their persecution of the church,” the diocese said in a separate statement. “The trial appears to be evolving into a circus with no rules and boundaries.”

Apparently at issue is the appearance at the trial as a material witness of a Wheeling priest, Monsignor Kevin Quirk, rector of the cathedral. A local judge is expected to rule tomorrow (4/20) whether Monsignor Quirk is required to testify.

Wheeling Jesuit: six-year conspiracy to misuse millions?

AP’s Wheeling Jesuit and Davitt McAteer story by Vicki Smith in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — One of the world’s foremost experts on mine safety — from gold mines in Chile to the coal mines of southern West Virginia — stands accused by a NASA fraud investigator of conspiring with the Catholic college where he now works to use millions of federal grant dollars for personal gain and the school’s benefit.

It’s in a sworn affidavit by a NASA Inspector General agent “used to obtain search warrants.”

The sworn affidavit by an agent who works out of the Goddard Space Center in Greenbelt, Md., said those expenses range from McAteer’s salary — which surged from $130,300 in 2006 to $230,659 by 2008 — to cellphones, computers, technical support and salaries for other staff, including a secretary in McAteer’s Shepherdstown [WV] private law office.

McAteer’s reports on mine disasters at the governor’s request have been scrutinized.

The reports he authored are now among the evidence that federal investigators are studying. Among the search warrant requests were “any and all documents” relating to work done on those three reports, including financial documents, travel expense, time cards and interview notes.

There were five NASA grants, regarding which:

[T]he agent found the duties and salaries of individuals “did not, in any way, benefit the substantive work being done on the federal award projects.”

“The motive for (McAteer’s) actions is evidenced by the substantial sum of money (Wheeling Jesuit) improperly received,” the agent concluded.

Wheeling Jesuit in jeopardy:

The university may have been complicit in five possible federal crimes: theft of federal funds; major fraud; conspiracy; false claims; and wire fraud, the document said.

There were warnings:

At least twice, the affidavit said, witnesses interviewed for the investigation warned both McAteer and the school that they were breaking the law. A consulting firm hired in 2008 also made similar warnings, the document said.

“We will slowly work on making this right, but we can’t afford to do it at this time,” McAteer is said to have told top university officials in response to the consulting firm’s conclusion, according to the affidavit.

The officials concurred:

Documents the agent obtained indicate the school’s board of directors deliberately circumvented federal spending rules “for the purpose of sustaining . . . its general, non-federal program educational areas.”

The money flowed:

Between fiscal years 2000 and 2009, NASA gave Wheeling Jesuit more than $116 million, more than $65 million of that after McAteer took over the school’s Sponsored Programs Office in 2005.

A whistle-blower claimed she suffered retaliation:

A finance manager in that office told the investigator that McAteer created the Combined Cost Management Service Center when he took over. Merging the billing of the two centers allowed him “to control and consolidate all the expenses, regardless of whether such expenses were related to the federal awards.”

This points to Catherine Smith, who sued the university in January 2010 saying she lost her job “after questioning [as finance manager for the school’s sponsored programs] the way the school billed administrative expenses for government grants,” as reported by the Charleston State-Journal in a story posted Jan. 14, 2010 and reposted as “updated” Feb. 27, 2012.

Surprise: Catholic libs vs. Paul Ryan

Assorted Jesuits, Jesuit university teachers, and other liberal Catholics DO NOT LIKE Rep. Paul Ryan’s citing Catholic teaching in support of his budget.

Among his sins surely would be his embracing the long-ignored principle of subsidiarity, which says big organizations or governmental entities should butt out of matters better handled by smaller ones. 

In accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, neither the state nor any larger society should substitute itself for the initiative and responsibility of individuals and intermediary bodies.

No surprise here: A Jesuit history prof at a large Jesuit university told me 20 years ago that the principle no longer had currency.  If it did, one might add, big government would not be considered the cure-all it is treated as today.

It was Dorothy Day, I believe, who referred ironically to “holy mother the state.”  It’s a good phrase for today’s feckless reverence for big government — feckless in that it blissfully ignores the dangers of incipient statism, not to mention the perils of insolvency.

Schism healed: Pius X Catholics on way back to church

Very hot news in Catholic circles: the Society of St. Pius X, broken away from the Vatican since the 2nd  Vatican Council, is “on the verge” of reconciliation with the church.

It’s remotely comparable to the resolution and dissolution of The Great Schism of the 14th  century, the three-pope period when disarray was the order of the day. 

Benedict XVI is making it happen.  Standing objections by the SPX people to Vatican 2’s “rupture” or disruptive aspects will remain. 

Trust me, folks, it’s like The Episcopal Church U.S.A. making room for Evangelical Christians.  Somewhat like?  Am working on that.

In Oak Park it means that the Pius X Latin mass church at Ridgeland and Washington, kitty-corner from Julian Middle School, is no longer out of bounds for venturesome Catholics. 

More to come.  more more more

A St. Peter’s Sunday

Shot down to the Loop on Palm Sunday for mass at St. Peter’s on Madison Street.  Green Line Special, fast and easy.

I went partly for that urban anonymity celebrated 50 years ago by Harvey Cox in his Secular City.  I found the crowd leaving the 9:30 mass, then waited for the 11:00. 

Found the service:

Neither pedestrian nor parochial. 

Marvelous organ playing as mood-setter and during mass, never intrusive.  The hymns were sacred, no pop melodies to be heard.  Acoustics excellent, nearby pre-mass chatting was absorbed, presented no problem to the would-be meditater. 

Sermon short and to the point (after long reading of passion).  Reading mainly by 50–ish short-haired petite blond woman in vestments who in the spoken word approximated the depersonalized, ceremonial style of the chant.  Same for other parts taken, each by a priest — the celebrant and his helper at the altar, acting as a sort of combination deacon and server. 

Nothing amateurish or stylized about any of this.  Indeed, the whole liturgy exuded professionalism, as in the church’s excellent sound system.  The building itself matters, and expense is there, but there’s also attention to important detail.  It’s how a parish can spend its money well. 

Later: Holy (Maundy) Thursday and Good Friday, more of the same.  Huge crowds, as today, they crowded in the back at 1:15 or so, filled the center aisle waiting in silence to “adore” (I’d say “venerate”) the cross, a Good Friday staple.  Preacher noted that Jesus’ “It is finished” from the cross has recently been discovered (the Greek word) to mean pay or paid — “paid in full” on the recently excavated tax-collector’s site.  So Jesus paid up for us all, restoring the balance so we have an even playing field, you might say.

Personal high moment in today’s passion narrative, per John’s gospel, was Jesus from the cross, looking at his mother and saying, “Behold your son.”  Poignant doesn’t do that justice.  The preacher cited that, repeating from the gospel, as I recall, so chalk up another for him.

Occurred to me about St. Peter’s: it’s not a parish church, which I knew, but an adjunct to Old St. Mary’s, once on the south edge of the Loop, for some time now in the heart of the farther, relatively new South Loop residential neighborhood, whose parish includes the Loop.  I doubt if they have baptisms and weddings at St. Peter’s, for instance, though they clearly have regulars who donate and help out.  So what is it?  A mission church, for one of the nation’s biggest commercial districts.

Vanderbilt U. loses its Catholic presence

. . . as in its official Vanderbilt Catholic organization, which has shaken the campus dust off its feet and decamped.

Vandy said it had to open officers’ ranks to non-Catholics, as it told all religious groups regarding their various affiliations.

It’s as if the Society of Midland Authors were ordered by the City of Chicago to open its leadership to talk-show hosts who never wrote a line.

Which may happen some day if radio talkers ever get organized and swing prevailing opinion in a talking-over-writing direction.

Even liberals would oppose that one.

H/T: The Blaze and Nashville Tennessean