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A good part of yesterday dedicated to fiddling with the scanner.  I must say I am getting sore and tired of learning curves – never ending!   Downloading and scanning problems now resolved 🙂   I finally got Jacki Leroux’ article “Sins of the Fathers” scanned and posted.  It’s worth a read.  Lots of little gems of information tucked away in there.   While I was at it I decided to post “Church in denial” an insert which ran with the Sins of the Fathers: it deals primarily with Father Ken Keeler so I posted it as a Ken Keeler page. 

 Idid more reading of notes and papers on the Father Lorne Whalen saga.  What a royal convoluted dirty mess.  Would you believe, for example, that  Whalen justified searching for mates on cruise lines by saying that’s what a doctor  recommended he do when he was at  Southdown in 1984? 

 Seriously. 

Which doctor?  I haven’t the foggiest. 

I will carry on with this later today.  I have some family business to take care of but should be able to squeeze a few hours in and perhaps get a few more documents posted.

****

The word travelling in Catholic circles is that George Pell, the Cardinal Archbishop of Sydney Australia, is about to step into a highly influential Vatican post as Prefect for the Congregation for Bishops.  He would be replacing Cardinal Re who is due to retire. 

 “Orthodox”  Catholics from one corner of the world to the next are thrilled.  “Modernist” Catholics from one corner of the world to the next are not amused.  

No matter.  Catholics of all striped will be watching with great interest  Look for example, at what Pell had to say in an 18 May 2006 interview with LifesSteNews.com :

LifeSiteNews: Recently the Church has seen corruption enter into its own walls in the form of the sex abuse scandals. What do you think the root of that problem has been, and how does it relate to the culture at large? Do you think that the culture at large has played a big factor in that, or is it just a separate problem in and of itself?

Cardinal Pell: “Human nature is always weak, but I do believe that the problem has been worsened considerably because of the moral confusion in society: the weakening of the faith, the absence of clear moral lines. 

 “As you know most of the abuse, at least in the English speaking world, that is most of the clerical abuse, is not in the strictest terms pedophilia, but what’s called ephebophilia, and that is with young fellows as adolescents after puberty. And what is significantly different, which you would also probably be aware, is that 80% of the abuse is with young boys. So I mean it’s obviously connected with the problem of homosexuality. 

“I also think it’s connected remotely with false views of conscience, where people come to think that all truth is relative, and that you can choose for yourself, especially when the pressure is on. It’s not too difficult to deceive yourself morally. That’s especially true in matters of sexuality. Of course now there’s a very organized push to entice people into the world of active homosexuality.

 “All these factors have impinged on the Church life, and made it more difficult. I think we’ve made very, very considerable strides in addressing the problem of pedophilia. But we’ve also got to be aware that we don’t allow problems to develop with homosexuality just between adults within the church. We’ve got to see that this is not tolerated amongst clergy and religious orders.”

Not too often we hear anything like that from a Roman Catholic bishop these days, is it?  

Pell, however, like the majortiy of his episcopal colleagues, does not  have a stellar record when it comes to dealing with clerical sexual predators.  There are other articles online.  Google his name.  It’s not, from what I can see and form what I recall, a stellar record.   Indeed, in light of his words to LifeSiteNews, its all a bit oxymoronic.

 Cardinal Pell heading up the Congregation for Catholic Bishops, a good or a bad? 

I just don’ t know.

Actions speak louder than words.

We shall see. 

Enough for now,

Sylvia

(cornwall@theinquiry.ca)

This entry was posted in Accused or charged, Canada, Clerical sexual predators, Ephebophile, homosexual, Southdown, Vatican and tagged , , , , , , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

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