Speculation Swirls Around Benedict XVI's Abdication

While my last post made it clear that I will not be shedding any tears over I like many others wonder what may have pushed God's Rottweiler to abdicate.  Andrew Sullivan noted:

[T]he suddenness of this is striking. Are new revelations about the Vatican Bank or the child-rape crisis about to emerge? Is there a more urgent health problem that we are unaware of? Why not wait till after Easter at least? There will doubtless be a lot of speculation and gossip.

 Interestingly enough Slate republished today a 2010 piece by the late Christopher Hitchens that zoomed in on Benedict XVI's personal involvement in the rampant, worldwide sex abuse scandal.   With countless addition secret internal documents to be released by the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, it doesn't stretch the imagination that something explosive might exist that could be extremely damaging.  Here are highlights from the 2010 piece:

Concerning the most recent revelations about the steady complicity of the Vatican in the ongoing—indeed endless—scandal of child rape, a few days later a spokesman for the Holy See made a concession in the guise of a denial. It was clear, said the Rev. Federico Lombardi, that an attempt was being made "to find elements to involve the Holy Father personally in issues of abuse." He stupidly went on to say that "those efforts have failed."

He was wrong twice. In the first place, nobody has had to strive to find such evidence: It has surfaced, as it was bound to do. In the second place, this extension of the awful scandal to the topmost level of the Roman Catholic Church is a process that has only just begun. Yet it became in a sense inevitable when the College of Cardinals elected, as the vicar of Christ on Earth, the man chiefly responsible for the original cover-up. (One of the sanctified voters in that "election" was Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston, a man who had already found the jurisdiction of Massachusetts a bit too warm for his liking.)

There are two separate but related matters here: First, the individual responsibility of the pope in one instance of this moral nightmare and, second, his more general and institutional responsibility for the wider lawbreaking and for the shame and disgrace that goes with it. The first story is easily told, and it is not denied by anybody. In 1979, an 11-year-old German boy identified as Wilfried F. was taken on a vacation trip to the mountains by a priest. After that, he was administered alcohol, locked in his bedroom, stripped naked, and forced to suck the penis of his confessor. (Why do we limit ourselves to calling this sort of thing "abuse"?) The offending cleric was transferred from Essen to Munich for "therapy" by a decision of then-Archbishop Joseph Ratzinger, and assurances were given that he would no longer have children in his care. But it took no time for Ratzinger's deputy, Vicar General Gerhard Gruber, to return him to "pastoral" work, where he soon enough resumed his career of sexual assault.

Very much more serious is the role of Joseph Ratzinger, before the church decided to make him supreme leader, in obstructing justice on a global scale. After his promotion to cardinal, he was put in charge of the so-called "Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith" (formerly known as the Inquisition). In 2001, Pope John Paul II placed this department in charge of the investigation of child rape and torture by Catholic priests. In May of that year, Ratzinger issued a confidential letter to every bishop. In it, he reminded them of the extreme gravity of a certain crime. But that crime was the reporting of the rape and torture. The accusations, intoned Ratzinger, were only treatable within the church's own exclusive jurisdiction. Any sharing of the evidence with legal authorities or the press was utterly forbidden. Charges were to be investigated "in the most secretive way ... restrained by a perpetual silence ... and everyone ... is to observe the strictest secret which is commonly regarded as a secret of the Holy Office … under the penalty of excommunication." (My italics). Nobody has yet been excommunicated for the rape and torture of children, but exposing the offense could get you into serious trouble. And this is the church that warns us against moral relativism! (See, for more on this appalling document, two reports in the London Observer of April 24, 2005, by Jamie Doward.)

The next item on this grisly docket will be the revival of the long-standing allegations against the Rev. Marcial Maciel, founder of the ultra-reactionary Legion of Christ, in which sexual assault seems to have been almost part of the liturgy. Senior ex-members of this secretive order found their complaints ignored and overridden by Ratzinger during the 1990s, if only because Father Maciel had been praised by the then-Pope John Paul II as an "efficacious guide to youth." And now behold the harvest of this long campaign of obfuscation. The Roman Catholic Church is headed by a mediocre Bavarian bureaucrat once tasked with the concealment of the foulest iniquity, whose ineptitude in that job now shows him to us as a man personally and professionally responsible for enabling a filthy wave of crime. Ratzinger himself may be banal, but his whole career has the stench of evil—a clinging and systematic evil that is beyond the power of exorcism to dispel. What is needed is not medieval incantation but the application of justice—and speedily at that.

Hitchen's words are as true today as they were back in 2010. Benedict XVI or whatever he will be called after his abdication needs to be criminally prosecuted for his involvement in crimes against children.  The Vatican should not be allowed to try to whitewash his grievous offenses.

Ill Papa Visits Mexico

I noted recently that a new book on the sex abuse scandal surrounding the Legion of Christ, founded in Mexico, by a horrific sexual abuser, was released just in time for Pope Benedict XVI/s arrival. As the sign above indicates, not everyone is pleased to have on of Fr. Marcil's protectors in their country. Here are some more details from Blabbeando:

A number of Mexican LGBT and sexual health advocates gathered yesterday at Mexico City's Glorieta de La Independencia yesterday to extend a less than warm welcome to Pope Benedict XVI.

Chanting "You are a foe to many human rights" and "You protect pedophiles and then act saintly", activists asked the Pope to leave.

Ricardo Baruch, Director of the Youth Coalition for Sexual and Reproductive Rights, said that the protest was not meant to be an attack on those who believe in God. Instead, he said it was a direct condemnation of Pope Benedict XVI and the Catholic leadership and their attempt to impose the retrograde policies of the Vatican on the nation of Mexico.

Baruch also questioned the use of federal tax funds in support of the three-day visit, the Pope's refusal to meet with victims of pedophilia in the hands of the Mexican Legionaries of Christ and his opposition to reproductive rights for women.

The world is changing even if the Catholic hierarchy refuses to accept modernity. And I agree with the protesters - if the Pope wants to visit places around the world, then the Vatican can pay for all of the costs.

Book on Legion of Christ Sex Abuse Scandal to Overshadow Pope's Visit to Mexico

I have long maintained that the Roman Catholic Church sex abuse scandal epitomizes the moral bankruptcy of the Roman Catholic Church's utter moral bankruptcy. However, few of the disgusting vile stories track directly to the Vatican than that of Rev. Marciel Maciel, the Mexican founder of the disgraced Legion of Christ religious order who was a drug addict and pedophile - and a protected favorite of the far less than saintly Pope John Paul II. The story of Marceil is an indictment of both John Paul II and his successor, Benedict XVI who as the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a/k/a the Inquisition, knew full well about the horrible and tawdry behavior of Marceil. Thankfully, a new book on the sins and sexual abuse of Marceil is being released just in time for Pope Benedict XVI's disingenuous PR trip to Mexico. In my view, Benedict XVI needs to have Marceil hung around his neck. Yes, his apologists will try to shift blame to John Paul II, but Benedict XVI could have done more to stop Marceil and he chose not to do so. Failures to act can be just as damning as acts of malfeasance. Here are some highlights from Huffington Post on what is likely to greet the Nazi Pope:

Pope Benedict XVI arrives in Mexico this week to a very public reminder of one of the Catholic Church's most egregious sex abuse scandals: A new book says internal Vatican documents show the Holy See knew decades ago of allegations that the Mexican founder of the disgraced Legion of Christ religious order was a drug addict and pedophile.

The documentation has been compiled in a book "La voluntad de no saber" ("The will to not know"), which is co-authored by Jose Barba, a former Legion priest who along with other priests in 1998 brought a church trial against the Legion's founder, the Rev. Marciel Maciel, for having sexually abused them while they were seminarians.

While details of the abuse were made public years ago, the new documents seem to solidify proof that the Vatican knew of the allegations long before taking action. Excerpts of the book were published by the Mexican magazine Proceso on Sunday.

"The importance of this book is that it documents the irrefutable evidence and proof that the Vatican has been lying about Maciel," said Bernardo Barranco, an expert from the Religious Studies Center of Mexico and author of the prologue of the new text.

The former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Benedict, headed the office that received their complaint in 1998, but it took the Vatican eight years to sanction Maciel for the crimes, while the accusers were branded as liars and discredited by the Legion.

Maciel, meanwhile, continued to enjoy Pope John Paul II's highest regard as the founder of one of the world's fastest-growing religious orders, able to attract money and vocations to the church despite the mounting accusations against him. . . . . Benedict took over the Legion in 2010 after the order finally admitted Maciel had molested seminarians and fathered three children with two women. A Vatican investigation determined Maciel, who died in 2008, was a religious fraud who had built an order based on silence and obedience that allowed his double life to go unchecked.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Barba said the book was based on information from some 212 documents in a Vatican archive that he said he had obtained from unnamed church officials.

The documentation, he said, demonstrates that the Vatican had information against Maciel as early as 1944 and particularly in the mid-1950s, when the Holy See launched its first investigation into the Mexican-born Maciel. The so-called apostolic visitation lasted from 1956 to 1958, during which time Maciel was suspended as the Legion's superior, though he was subsequently reinstalled.

The documents "show with complete clarity that the Vatican knew the true nature of this man, the accusations, the opinion of experts, the revision of other experts on top of previous experts, and the opinions that the apostolic visitors gave," Barba said.

"The revelation of these documents, previously unknown to the great majority of Legionaries who acted in good faith, shows that there were solid grounds for the removal of Fr. Maciel more than 50 years ago," Gill said in an email, calling anew for the Vatican to further investigate how Maciel could have hidden his behavior from public view for so long.

The Catholic blogger Cassandra Jones, for example, has cited letters sent in 1956 from the bishops of Cuernavaca, Mexico, and Mexico City to the Vatican's office for religious orders recommending Maciel's removal and a Vatican investigation into what Cuernavaca's then-bishop Sergio Mendez Arceo termed "devious and lying behavior, use of narcotic drugs, acts of sodomy with boys of the congregation."

But "La Voluntad de no saber," which comes out on Benedict's first full day in Mexico, promises more complete documentation from the Vatican's own archives. While the book is only being published in Spanish in Mexico with an initial run of 6,000 copies, the documentation will be available on a website, , organizers said. http://www.lavoluntaddenosaber.com

Benedict himself has acknowledged Maciel was a "false prophet" but has insisted that he only learned the true nature of the allegations against Maciel in 2000. His office received Barba's complaint in 1998 and the Vatican's office for religious orders received the Mexican bishops' charges in 1956.

Barba and other victims have said they would never agree to a meeting with Benedict since it was his old office – the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith – that sat on the case for eight years while they suffered the Legion's defamation campaign to discredit them.

"For nothing in the world would I ever meet with someone who protected Maciel when he should have been punished," said Jose Antonio Perez Olvera, a former Legionary who was sexually abused by Maciel. "We don't make deals with criminals, nor with those who were their protectors and accomplices."

Sadly, too many Catholics refuse to admit that the Vatican is a foul criminal enterprise that has protected child rapists on literally a global basis. And if the sex abuse wasn't enough in and of itself to expose the criminality of the Vatican, now it appears that the Vatican Bank may have been laundering money - something that has caused JP Morgan Chase to close accounts with the Vatican Bank. The Daily Beast has coverage on this new banking scandal. Here are some excerpts:

The Vatican is in public-relations panic-mode ... again. But it’s not the pedophile priest scandal or Vatileaks that has the pope’s image-makers hopping. This time the Holy See faces serious allegations that its curious accounting practices are really a cover for a money-laundering scheme.

On March 30, the Milan branch of the global investment bank JPMorgan Chase will officially close the Vatican bank’s account No. 1365—held by the Institute for Works of Religion, or the IOR—on speculation that the account is being used for less-than-immaculate financial deeds. JPMorgan Chase sent a letter to the Vatican on Feb. 15 to notify them of the closure after the Vatican bankers were “unable to respond” to a series of requests about questionable money transfers from the account. The JPMorgan Chase account was a “sweeping facility” that was zeroed out at the end of each business day. The account, which was opened in 2009, had processed some $1.5 billion in funds to other Vatican accounts—mostly in Germany—during the short time it was open, . . . . the fact that Vatican bankers couldn’t quite explain the reason they moved so much money in such a short period of time led the bank to close the account.

Earlier this month, the U.S. State Department named the Holy See on a list of its own, as a “jurisdiction of concern” for money-laundering practices in its annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, alongside countries like Honduras and Syria.

“The best way for the Vatican to come clean would of course be to close the bank: it’s hard to see why it’s needed other than to shroud the Church’s financial dealings in a veil of obsessive secrecy,” he [Reuters financial columnist Pierre Briançon] wrote in a recent blog post. “Barring such a radical exorcism, a clean sweep is in order.”

Sexual abuse of children, protecting and covering up for sexual predators and money laundering - what does it take to make rank and file Catholics to open their eyes to the truth about the putrid Church leadership in Rome? If one has a shred of moral decency, I honestly do not understand how they can continue to hand money over the the Catholic Church.

More Bad News for Pepophile Protectors at the Vatican

If it were not for the fact that many tens of thousand innocent young lives were damaged - and in some cases utterly destroyed, it would almost be gratifying to see the hubris of the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy leading it headlong into an almost endless stream of scandals and revelations concerning the cover up of sexual abuse crimes. Cover ups that trace all the way up to the Vatican and the hands of Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI. Amazingly, the untethered loons at the highest levels of the Church still do not grasp that people are increasingly over their disingenuous bullshit. One such example comes from Ireland where the Catholic Church has sought to undermine domestic partnership legislation to benefit same sex couples. The Digital Journal looks at the hammering that the Irish hierarchy has brought upon itself. Here are some highlights:
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The Catholic Church in Ireland has come under fire from civil-rights groups and members of the Irish parliament after bishops demanded a free vote on civil partnerships. A free vote would mean legislators could vote according to their conscience, rather than obey a party whip. Clergy want the new measure to give rights to civil registrars to refuse to perform same-sex ceremonies, according to the Irish Times.
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But Mark Kelly, director of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL), criticised the Catholic bishops for their stance. He’s quoted as saying: “The ICCL seriously doubts that the Irish Catholic bishops retain sufficient moral authority to pontificate on the Civil Partnership Bill,” he said, referring to the scandal over sex abuse by Catholic priests.
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The bishops have also come under fire from the Union of Students in Ireland (USI), which has expressed disappointment that the bishops are resisting equality for gay couples. The USI’s president, Peter Mannion, is quoted as saying: “While USI respects the viewpoint of the Catholic Church we do not agree with it. Objecting to the implementation of equal rights for Irish citizens may be seen as an absence of moral conscience.”
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Even more damning for the Church is an upcoming program on ABC that will feature an interview with the son of Father Marcial Maciel, founder of the Legion for Christ and personal favorite of the less than saintly Pope John Paul II. That's right, the SON of a supposedly celibate priest. But it gets worse. Maciel did not only engage in sex acts with women, but also young seminarians and his own son. And John Paul II protected Maciel for many years. Here are some highlights from ABC News:
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A prominent Catholic priest, praised by Pope John Paul II as "an efficacious guide to youth," Father Marcial Maciel, sexually abused not only young seminarians under his control but also abused his own children, according to a lawsuit filed today in Connecticut by a man who claims to be Maciel's son.
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In an interview to be broadcast Monday evening on ABC News Nightline, the priest's son, Raul Gonzalez, 30, says he thought his father worked for the CIA or an international oil company, until he saw the priest's picture in a 1997 magazine article detailing allegations of sexual abuse.
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Under Father Maciel, the Legion of Christ became one of the Roman Catholic Church's most prominent, conservative and financially successful orders. Among its many supporters is Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim. The lawsuit claims Vatican ignored reports of sexual abuse by Maciel since the 1950s, until he was forced out of the Legion by Pope Benedict XVI in 2006.
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The lawsuit filed by Maciel's alleged son claims the Vatican and the presiding Pope from the 1950's until 2002 "engaged in a conspiracy to conceal their knowledge of Maciel's serial delicts, including the repeated sexual abuse of children."
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Gonzalez said his father began to abuse him and his half-brother, Omar, on a trip to Madrid when he was ten years old. . . . Gonzalez's lawyer, Jeffrey Anderson, who has represented hundreds of people who have alleged sexual abuse by Catholic priests, says this case represents a new chapter of depravity in the church.
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"We are here to tell the truth," Anderson told ABC News. At a press conference Monday, Anderson asked how the Vatican could explain its failure to act. "How could Vatican officials allow such a dangerous predator to roam the landscape and the globe with the power given to him as the founder of the Legion of Christ?"
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Utterly depraved conduct known to and covered up by a reigning Pope. And far right Catholics want John Paul II canonized? It is beyond sick and yet again demonstrates why I am no longer a Catholic. I want nothing to do with such moral bankruptcy.

Roman Catholic Church: A Study in How Absolute Power Corrupts

Just when you think that things cannot get any messier for the Nazi Pope, new information explodes about the late Rev. Marcial Maciel Degollado, the founder of the Legionaries of Christ, who despite many reports of abuse of young men was protected by the less than saintly John Paul II and up until 2006 by Benedict XVI as well. Marceil was finally barred from public ministry by Benedict XVI in 2006 because the dirt was just getting too hard to cover up. Now it seems, based on a Boston Globe story, that Marceil also had at least one child with a woman with whom he was having a relationship. Marceil personifies the problem within the Church in terms of sexually dysfunctional clergy - caused by an unholy obsession with demonizing sex - and the resulting sexual abuse of minors:

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Most psychiatrists and psychologists, however, say that sexual abuse against minors is not so much an indication of sexual orientation--whether homosexual or heterosexual--as much as it indicates a stunted or malformed sexuality overall.

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What does this mean on a bigger picture scale? It means that due to the dictatorship weilded by the last two Popes within the Church, needed discussions and honest evaluations simply have not and do not occur and that the absolute power these two failable and unsaintly men have exercised is a recipe for long term disaster. Andrew Sullivan has a very insightful post that examines this destructive phenomenon. Here are some highlights:

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There is, it seems to me, a connecting thread between all the various depressing bits of Catholic news this past week, beginning with the clueless, insular outreach to reactionary SSPX anti-Semites and culminating in the latest revelations about the serial child rapist protected by John Paul II, Father Maciel. That thread is not sex or anti-Semitism. It is the abuse of absolute clerical power.

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In their panicked reaction to the reforms of the Second Vatican Council and its expansion of lay and episcopal power within a more inclusive church, the last two Popes relied on raw papal power to get their way. They did not persuade many on, say women priests or contraception or the "objective disorder" of homosexuals. But it became pretty clear after a while that persuasion was never the point. When the Pope simply declared certain topics undiscussable - and when he enforced that silence within the Church by policing dissent and appointing generations of docile flunkies as bishops and cardinals - he was telling us that he was restoring hierarchy.

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And so Holocaust-deniers slip through the cracks because the Pope sees them first of all as his ideological and theological allies, and does not subject them to the same scrutiny as his opponents within the Church. And a monster like Marcial Maciel can be protected by Wojtila and Ratzinger for years and years, even as the evidence of his corruption and rank abuse of power is overwhelming.

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The authoritarian, unaccountable, reactionary hierarchy that the last two Popes have constructed is beginning to collapse in on itself. It has solved no core questions; it has advanced no deeper, lasting ideas; it has led to the implosion of the Church in Western Europe and forced many American Catholics into a provisional relationship with their own church authorities. Maciel and Williamson are symptoms of this disease. But John Paul II and Benedict XVI are its enablers.