I will get and post the next court dates for previously convicted former church organist Brian Lucy, female Ottawa area Catholic school teacher facing sex charges Jessica Beraldin, and lay-contributor to the CCCB’s 1992 sex abuse guidelines Father Stephen Amesse.
*****
A reminder for those in the Windsor area to mark your calendars for next week. Yes, this is a long weekend 🙂 So, Monday is a day off for most people, then, starting on Tuesday 24 May 2016 through to Thursday 26 May 2016 Father Linus Bastien has a fitness hearing scheduled:
24 -26May 2016: 10 am, fitness hearing set for three days, Windsor Superior Court of Justice (245 Windsor Avenue)
This is probably yet another attempt by Bastien to avoid trial. He was first charged back in October 2011! He was committed to stand trial 03 March 2014. At the start of this year he was engaged in a court battle with, in essence, the claim that he never should have been charged in the first place. He lost that one. Now he’s moved on to the fitness business.
I encourage those who can do so to try to get there to find out exactly what his arguments are.
Unconscionable! It truly is unconscionable that a man who calls himself a Roman Catholic priest would go to such lengths to either postpone or avoid trial.
Please keep all the complainants in your prayers.
*****
An additional note re Father Barry McGrory and the Ottawa Archdiocese’s 1997 assurance to Collen Passard that McGrory has been defrocked/laicized after his conviction in 1993,- during several of those years Father McGrory was in fact living with with the nuns who once occupied St. Joseph’s Convent in Morrow Park, Toronto. The property was apparently sold but some of the nuns were allowed to stay on in the premises and McGrory stayed on with them – during his years there he unfortunately served as their chaplain – ‘saying’ Masses and ‘hearing’ their confessions.
*****
There are three articles from this past week on which I wish to comment. For now, my quick comment on the following:
(1) 18 May 2016: Archdiocese of Ottawa comments on articles in the Ottawa Citizen concerning cases of clergy abuse
Note:
“For many years now, we have been engaged in a process of justice and reconciliation with victims of abuse by members of our clergy. The reality is that most victims now choose the criminal and civil courts to seek redress.”
Is this a reference to the process whereby for countless years victims were ‘paid off’ and gagged? the process which has ensured that the identities of many a known clerical molester would never see the light of day? the same process which has allowed known sexual predators to be blithely recycled from parish to parish, or diocese to diocese, or even country to country?
Is that the same process whereby those priests who committed egregious crimes were time and time and time spared the ‘pain’ and humiliation and of being reported to police? and whereby predatory priests, through perhaps the sins omission and/or commission of their episcopal and diocesan enablers avoided the pursuit of justice ? the process which repeatedly failed to abide by the law and report credible allegations of abuse to Children’s Aid Society when children were obliviously being placed at risk?
Seriously?
Is that what we’re talking about?
And, then, in the next para, this:
Archbishop Terrence Prendergast has made it his clear policy and practice that any priest, who is found guilty in a criminal trial or found liable in a civil action, is prohibited from conducting any and all ministry and from presenting himself as a Catholic priest. Further, the Archdiocese complies with the most recent Vatican procedures that require that such cases be reported to Vatican offices for review and decision as to the clerical status of such priests.
More dancing
Tap dancing aside, note the operative words in that above para referencing any priest “who is found guilty in a criminal trial or found liable in a civil action…”
That begs the question. What of those predatory priests whose identities are not known publicly specifically because the victims pursued the “process of justice and reconciliation” and are gagged? There’s no criminal trial there, is there, so obviously there is no chance of a guilty verdict? And, there’s no civil action, is there, so obviously there is no opportunity for the priest to found liable?
Why no mention of what becomes of those predatory priests who are dealt with through the process of justice and reconciliation?
Strange? Or, am I missing something?
The bottom of the line and the truth of the matter is that every priest who is a known molester, be he convicted criminally, or found liable civilly – or having credible allegations against him via some truth and reconciliation process! – – must be defrocked. The molester has proven himself to be unfit to be a priest. Never mind this endless chatter about suspending faculties, and never mind not allowing him to present himself as a Catholic priest. He is still a priest. He is not an ex priest. He is not a former priest. He is still , to the great shame of those who insist we tolerate his presence in the priesthood, a Roman Catholic priest.
This is all a further betrayal of the victims, an affront to our intelligence, and an insult to Almighty God.
*****
Happy Victoria Day weekend everyone. Beautiful weather 🙂
Enough for now.
Sylvia
In regards to Father Barry McGrory he is not alone in terms of being put with nuns and allowed to be their Chaplin, say mass and hear their confessions. The Archdiocese of Regina also had that happen with convicted molester and now deceased Fr. Kenneth Greer. When he was convicted the people who followed his trial and approached the diocese where told the same thing as Colleen was, he would no longer function as a priest in any capacity. Yet he was quietly put with a cloistered group of nuns who he ministered to, both with mass and confessions. When confronted the line was the nuns knew so there was no issue. They didn’t care about the families that took their children their for mass, they didn’t know he was a sexual abuser.
I would not be surprised to see this happen in many other places when people were told the molester would not be allowed to function as a priest. I guess like Greer they hope they die before things get heated for them.
JAV