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Church Fire
The Church Possessed

The Homosexualist Revolution
In the Roman Catholic Church

By Philip D. Ropp

January 21, 2008

Contents

Introduction: "We Have Met the Enemy"
    
     One rainy summer day many years ago, I was in Bob's chair at The Strand Barber Shop getting a haircut when the conversation suddenly turned from the trials and tribulations of the Detroit Tigers to a local scandal that was then in progress.  The pastor of a large and prosperous local Protestant church had recently submitted his resignation to the church's governing board  because of several extra-marital affairs that he had conducted with various women in his congregation over a period of several years.  When one of these women tearfully confessed her indiscretion to her husband, it inspired some of the others to likewise come forward, and the result was both ugly and embarrassing.  So much so, that the ensuing turmoil within this church became gossip fodder for the local beauty parlors and barbershops for several weeks during what was otherwise another uneventful and quiet Alma, Michigan summer.

     I kept my mouth shut, as I didn't want Bob to get any more distracted than he already was, and Bob and his partner, Don, both veterans in the local barber trade, seemed to know instinctively that this was one of those situations in which discretion truly was the better part of valor.  When the talk turned to the fact that many church  members had left the congregation in light of these revelations, a bearded man in a denim vest looked up from a past issue of Field and Stream and, in the local vernacular, asked rhetorically, "Ain't that the shits?"  All present agreed; indeed it was.  "Why, he was a damn good pastor!" he added.  One of the other patrons, a man in a greasy blue work shirt said thoughtfully, "Well, I guess it just goes to show you: The flock is bound to scatter when the shepherd gets caught screwing the sheep."

     There is more than a little truth embedded within this rather salty nugget of barbershop wisdom.  As Roman Catholics, we are all too familiar with the sexual abuse scandals that have played like cheap and tawdry theater within the American media since becoming a part of our daily news diet in 2002.  Then there are those that stand up and point towards Europe and the rest of the world as if we are to be comforted in some perverse way because this kind of thing goes on in such traditionally Catholic places as Ireland, Mexico and even in the shadow of the Vatican itself, in Italy.  It is, in actuality, a global situation.  Statistical reports tell us that only a small fraction of the Catholics in some European countries attend Mass weekly, and it is certainly no secret that in the United States participation in the local parishes, particularly in the "liberal" dioceses, has been in a precipitous free fall for the past couple of generations.  

     One should not be so naive as to presume that this scattering of our Catholic flocks is solely the result of the clergy sexual abuse scandal: there is way more to it than this.  However, this and the highly questionable way that much of the American Catholic hierarchy has responded -- or failed to respond -- is certainly indicative of the quality of leadership that we have come to expect from too many of our bishops.  The ugly truth of it; a truth that the secular media don't get, and that the Catholic media choose to ignore, is that the Catholic Church, from the hierarchy on down to the laity, has sinned against the Gospel of Christ: the hierarchy by what it has done and the laity by what it has failed to do.  And so we should ask Blessed Mary ever Virgin, all the angels and saints, and all of our brothers and sisters throughout the ranks of the entire Church to pray for us to the Lord our God; for the Church of Jesus Christ finds itself in desperate straights. 

     The clergy sexual abuse scandal is merely the most literal and public way in which the shepherds have been caught in the act of violating the sheep, and it is little wonder our flocks have scattered.   However, the bottom line reason why something like this clergy abuse scandal could continue unchecked for some 50 years or more is because the laity have truly chosen to behave like hapless sheep and have allowed it to occur.  It is we, the Catholic faithful, that have stood and refused to acknowledge that the emperor has no clothes, while the hierarchy and clergy have paraded (and sometimes quite literally) naked before us.  It is we, the Catholic faithful, that have sat and done and said nothing, as a vast portion of the Church we profess our faith in has turned from the holy gospel of Jesus Christ, to an unholy gospel of satanic hedonism.  It is we, the Catholic faithful, that have laid down and allowed, without so much as a whimper, the institution charged with the salvation of the world to become infected with a worldly and hideous spiritual cancer.  And it is we, the Catholic faithful, that will have no one to blame but ourselves if this cancer, unchecked, continues to spread through our ranks and threaten our children with moral destruction, and those that allow this to occur with the very fires of hell itself. 

     This cancer is an age old sin.  It is the way of the pagans whose culture of sin Catholic Christianity supplanted.  It is a sin that has led the way in the resurgence of this pagan culture in our own time, because we have behaved in public as we have in church, and have allowed this to occur as well.  And so, because we have become cowards, or, worse, have become converted to the cause, we now find ourselves in a time in which, if we do not celebrate this sin, then we dare not utter even a word that might be taken as opposition to it.  To do so is viewed as an offense in the eyes of the world, and because we have ceased to be offended, we have now become the offenders.  The sin is homosexuality.  And, as we begin to explore the devastating effect this sin has had, and is having, upon the Church of Jesus Christ, I suggest we resist the temptation to fix blame anywhere but where it truly belongs. 

     Like Pogo said, "We have met the enemy, and he is us!" 



Part 1: A Homosexual Subculture
 
     This clergy sexual abuse scandal then, as bad as it is, is not the full extent of the disease but merely the most visible and horrifying symptom.  More subtle, more dangerous and more deadly are the more numerous ways in which those that serve the Church have been educated into believing that Catholic teaching is an archaic and superstitious worldview that cannot hold up to the real truth as revealed through scientific -- and more often psuedo-scientific -- inquiry.  It is little wonder that the Church finds herself in this current state of affairs when what passes for education and formation within too many of our Catholic universities and seminaries is taken into account.  What Pope Benedict XVI has called the "dictatorship of relativism" is merely business as usual in the liberal Catholic institutions of higher education.  Homosexuality is not merely tolerated within these dens of academic iniquity, it is encouraged and celebrated and practiced, and woe be to he that should utter any word of criticism against this abomination that maketh desolate!

     And why not?  The Jesus Seminar here is taught as truth amidst historical claims that Jesus was no more than an effeminate peasant; a human teacher of Jewish platitudes.  The divine "Christ" is merely an invention of the charlatans of the Early Church --  the men that we have revered for two millennia as Apostles and Church Fathers.  John Dominic Crossan, co-founder of the Jesus Seminar, explains the disappearance of the dead body of Jesus by the theory that it was ravaged by dogs that roamed beneath the Cross:  So much for the resurrection, which is, for Crossan and his ilk, a "resurrection by faith:" a symbol of the new life the God Who Doesn't Care offers to all for free in the Neverland of No Responsibility; a land where anything goes and in which nothing is sin -- that land we once called death and hell and the grave. 

     So, too many of our most precious resource, young men studying for the priesthood of Christ, are taught to eat, drink and be merry in any perverted way that they choose, for they, like their professors before them, have been taught to reason that, "...tomorrow we die, and, enlightened like the Buddha, we will watch with our last fixed gaze as the vapor of our ethereal consciousness escapes into the cosmic void of the great Hindu oversoul." For them, Jesus is safely dead and Christ reduced to nothing more than petrified dog droppings buried beneath the sands of Golgotha.  Who is there to judge?  Indeed, why not bang the Buddhist prayer gong, and whirl like the drunken dervish, and chant the mantras of the Hindu demons?  And why not, when the day's seminar is over, explore the mystic nether realms of sex with one's own kind?  After all, whose business can it be but their own?

     Today, this is the philosophy behind much that calls itself "Catholic higher education" and "formation for the priesthood."

     When graduation day finally comes, like ants returning home from the trap, they quietly spread this poison into the parishes that they are ordained for, coating it in a sweet language that sounds something like traditional Catholic piety, while calling  it "the implementation of Vatican II."  And we wonder why our churches suffer from that condition which Soren Kierkegaard, in the guise of Anti-Climacus, referred to as "The Sickness Unto Death."

     Now, I fully understand that this is a sweeping generalization and that there certainly must be seminaries out there that are turning out fine young men of faith that are educated and formed into believing priests.  The description above is, rather, a composite of the worst traits and teachings of the most liberal of our seminaries.  And "liberal" is not truly a fair term, but rather pejorative, as the issue is, in reality, not merely liberal Christian intellectualizing, but rather the anti-Catholic and anti-Christian agenda that it too often breeds.  I say there must be seminaries that still teach and promote the true faith of Jesus Christ mostly because I truly want to believe this.  In the current political and social atmosphere of the western world, a world in which sexual sin of all kinds is celebrated as "freedom," while true liberty drowns in a sea of narcissistic socialism, it has become the height of "incorrectness" to speak out either in favor of Christ or in opposition to hedonistic sin.  Therefore, these faithful seminaries, if they are not conspicuous in their absence, are certainly deafening in their silence. 

     I am also not so naive as to assume that the, shall we say, more "traditional" institutions are not without their own grave flaws and shortcomings.  The dictatorship of relativism, and the neo-modernism that gives rise to it, is the all pervasive reality within the realm of secular education at all levels, and it certainly brings great influence to bear on Catholic and other forms of Christian education at all levels.  For that matter, it is important for students, especially at the highest levels of education, to be exposed to all major schools of thought and their philosophical underpinnings if one is going to be an effective defender of the faith.  "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer," just like Sun Tzu said.  When Christ is kept at the forefront of such an educational experience the end result is beneficial to all, and this should be preaching to the choir, as it was the Catholic Church that invented modern education to begin with, and certainly did so with the intention that it be Christ centered.  Therefore, it should be expected that our parochial school system, elementary and high schools, as well as our colleges, universities and seminaries should produce students with a well defined and genuine love for Jesus and knowledge of the true teachings of the Catholic Christian faith.  Historically this has been the case.  That this is only accomplished today to varying degrees is cause for no little serious and grave concern. That there are numerous Catholic institutions of higher learning that produce the  unholy and un-Catholic scenario as related above, and do so under the guise of Catholic education, is a legitimate and justifiable outrage.

     Ultimately, it is this outrageous far left educational philosophy, spawned to support a homosexual underground that is at best heretical and at worst apostate, that is the underlying cause of the sexual abuse crisis within the Catholic clergy.  As reported most notably by Michael S. Rose in his book Goodbye! Good Men and by the likes of Rod Dreher and Matt C. Abbott, along with numerous others, the clergy sexual abuse crisis is the tip of the iceberg rising above the reality of a homosexual subculture that exists and thrives within the Catholic priesthood and hierarchy.  And those that would sniff and point to this as conservative homophobia would do well to consider that it was Father Andrew Greeley, hardly a conservative by anyone's measure, that first coined the term "Lavender Mafia" to describe the homosexual cabal that controls seminaries, chanceries and much of the institutional church. 

     It is estimated that as many as one third or, perhaps, even half or more of the Catholic priests in the United States are homosexuals. The secular media, which live under the constant scrutiny of the various gay and lesbian lobbies that police the public forum for any signs of what they perceive to be "anti-gay hate-speak," report the sexual abuse scandal as an issue of "pedophile" priests, an expression which by definition would indicate a sexual perversion in which an adult is sexually attracted to prepubescent children.  It is a somewhat rare perversion that can manifest itself as either hetero or homo sexual, depending on the gender of the child preferred, but is most usually a heterosexual phenomenon.  Statistically, somewhere in the range of  80 to 90 per cent of the sexual abuse cases involving Catholic priests concern pubescent and young adult male victims.  This perversion is, more properly, called "pederasty," a form of predatory homosexuality in which older men prey upon such younger males.  The reality of the situation then, as pointed out by Rose and numerous other commentators, is that the clergy sexual abuse crisis within the Catholic Church is not about pedophilia but, rather, rampant, unchecked homosexuality.
 
     Once we have established the true nature of the Catholic clergy sexual abuse crisis as a homosexual problem rather than a true pedophile problem, then we can begin to assemble the pieces to this puzzle in such a way as to explain how and why this homosexual subculture is able to perpetuate itself  within the effected, or perhaps more properly, infected or infested Catholic seminaries and, in turn, the parishes. 

     The homosexual subculture within the Church works like this same subculture does within the greater society as a whole.  To be sure, they are indeed part of the same cultural phenomenon.  The homosexual community promotes a mythology of  homophobia; that is this now familiar idea that same sex attraction is a natural proclivity and a normal manifestation of human sexuality, and that the true abnormality is the fear (phobia)  that results from the revulsion that some individuals feel towards their own suppressed (and quite natural) homosexual desires.  This positions homosexuals, and those that share this same supposedly enlightened and superior perspective, to point fingers, wring hands and shout "homophobe" every time it is suggested that homosexual orientation might in any way be abnormal, or that homosexual activity might in any way be aberrant behavior. Western secular society has been so desensitized to this reverse logic that claims the abnormal as normal and the normal response to it as discriminatory, that it is now akin to racism to offer any public criticism (God forbid condemnation) of homosexuality.  This poses a particular dilemma for the Catholic Church, since, in Catholic teaching, homosexual orientation is considered "intrinsically disordered" and homosexual activity is considered mortal sin.

     Obviously, the homosexual community within the Catholic Church has assumed the position of the dominant culture: that homosexual behavior and activity are the norm and that the Church's position, which is based on Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition and St. Thomas Aquinas' teaching on natural law, is outmoded and incorrect. While there are many so called homosexual Christian intellectuals that attempt to reinterpret the Biblical passages that condemn homosexual behavior, the Scripture continues to read as it always has, and, likewise, attempts at a theology that favors homosexuality must be equally contrived.  This is not to say that much of the best of this Biblical reinterpretation and theologizing doesn't convey a certain ring of authenticity:  Contrived theology and manipulated Biblical exegesis have for eons led astray those that would attempt to justify heresy and has done so precisely because the author was clever enough or talented enough to create a certain air of plausibility. However, any theology and/or attempt to interpret Scripture that begins with an a priori assumption, in this case that homosexuality is favorable to God, is by it's very nature heretical.  It begins with a preconception and the goal from the outset is justification of that which is contrary to established truth.  Orthodoxy begins with Scripture as this established truth and seeks to interpret God's meaning correctly and establish sound doctrine by the correct application of theology. To assert that homosexuality is somehow not condemned in Scripture or Tradition and that Thomistic teaching in regards to natural law is either in error or invalid is clearly heretical.  When the homosexual community within Catholicism, and the coalition of liberals  within the hierarchy, clergy, religious and laity that form the support group for it, assume that the current popular social teaching is right and should, therefore, supplant Catholic teaching, this is heresy.

     The way that this homosexual heresy perpetuates itself in the Church is by functioning like the true subculture that it is.  Homosexuals are attracted to the priesthood because it provides an atmosphere in which the basic form of community is dominated by men of like age and, when the administration of the seminary is oriented around the homosexual lifestyle, like homosexual preference.  Many seminaries do this to the virtual exclusion of heterosexual candidates.  It is an atmosphere in which it is natural that men live in a situation that is exclusive of women and, therefore, provides the perfect breeding ground for this homosexual subculture.  This is also why so many of the Catholic religious orders for both men and women have become homosexually oriented, and while the focus here is primarily on the seminaries and the effects of a homosexual parish priesthood, it is certainly fair to note that the homosexual subculture is prevalent throughout the Church and is also deeply embedded within the order priesthoods and among the religious of both genders.

     Since a "subculture" by definition deviates from the norms of the larger group that it exists within, and because of this does so largely in secret, it is actually amazing and quite bold that the homosexual subculture within Catholicism is as visible and strident as it is.  However, since its goal is the perversion of the Church and the theology that supports this is so obviously heretical, and the behavior itself is still considered sinful by the rank and file of the faithful, what goes on in secret is even more widespread and disturbing than the more public posturing.  When a dwelling has a subculture of cockroaches, they respond to a light switched on by running for cover, and, as any exterminator will tell you, those that you see scurrying represent only a small fraction of the total infestation.



Part 2: The Enormity of the Situation

     For generations, the Catholic Church has used the position of altar server to identify boys and young men that have a calling to the vocation of the priesthood.  Given the scenario of the homosexual seminary, it is a fair question to ask where so many candidates for a homosexual priesthood are recruited from.  The answer, shocking as it is, is from one of the most traditional of all sources, the ranks of the altar servers.  Now, to be sure, this is not the only source, but the number of boys and young men molested by priests that were altar servers when this happened is both remarkable and understandable.  Priests have access to altar servers in private situations, and, beyond this, the homosexual priest has the ability and training to identify pubescent boys within his parish that are showing signs of adolescent sexual confusion, and can prey upon their vulnerability by befriending them and directing them towards serving at the altar. 

     And so, orientation to service to the Church can also contain a sexual orientation component, and when we consider that the priest engaged in this activity has learned to justify his own homosexuality on a theological level, then it becomes easy to understand just how powerful the motivation for this process can be.  Some of these victims of molestation most certainly end up studying for the priesthood in an environment in which homosexuality is taught and celebrated, and so this system perpetuates itself.  Some of these victims of molestation most certainly end up convinced that they are homosexuals and end up living a homosexual lifestyle, even though they do not choose the priestly vocation.  Some of these victims of  molestation suffer from guilt and trauma and, sometimes decades after the fact, end up going public with their accusations of priestly abuse and inspire others to do likewise, and this surfaces in the public arena as the clergy abuse scandal.  This is the tip of the aforementioned ice berg:  Based on nationwide data collected by The California Office for the Safeguard of Children, it is estimated that as few as 6 percent of those sexually abused by priests have ever reported the activity.

     As the clergy abuse scandal unfolded, the Dallas Morning News published a list of one hundred bishops, one administrator, sixteen archbishops and eight cardinals within the United States that had knowingly allowed priests with a history of sexual abuse to continue in ministry.  This comprehensive study, compiled over three months, was meticulously detailed and, while naming roughly two thirds of the nation's top Catholic leaders, offered the caveat that its authors knew it to be incomplete. 

     Now we can begin to grasp the enormity of the situation, and the true extent to which the hierarchy of the Catholic Church in the United States has downplayed the real nature of the problem of clergy sexual abuse, and  ignored the ongoing issue of a vast homosexual network within the ranks of not only the seminaries and diocesan priesthood, but within the religious orders and the hierarchy itself.  Now we can begin to grasp the vast extent to which the hierarchy of the Church, from Rome to the parish level, has let down the faithful and compromised not only the safety of our youth, but the Catholic Faith itself.  This is the Faith of the angels and the saints, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and Jesus Christ.  Heaven weeps for us, and had we the sense to know the gravity of our own situation, we would weep for ourselves and for our children, for surely today we have the answer to Jesus' question in Luke 23:31, and know full well what happens when the tree is dry.

     On November 17, 2006, the former Apostolic Delegate to the United States, Archbishop Jean Jadot, was awarded the Hans Küng Rights of Catholics in the Church Award by none other than the Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church. The ARCC is a coalition of those on the far left fringe of the Catholic Church that states its mission thusly: "To bring about substantive structural change in the Catholic Church, ARCC seeks to institutionalize a collegial understanding of Church in which decision making is shared and accountability is realized among Catholics of every kind and condition."  As Catholic Culture, the web site of Trinity Communications aptly explains, "This translates into consistent dissent from Church teaching on a multitude of issues, including celibacy for priests, contraception, women priests, divorce and remarriage, and homosexual behavior."  The implication is that these are the issues that concern the laity of the Catholic Church and that it is the hierarchy that is out of step with this "progressive" attitude of the faithful.  This is, of course, a lie of vast and staggering proportion, the truth being that these are the views of a strident and highly vocal minority led by homosexuals, feminists, liberationists and other liberals bent on using the Catholic Church to advance their own selfish and demonstrably un-Christian agenda.  Hans Küng, a radical theologian banned by the Vatican from teaching Catholic Theology at the University of Tübingen, Germany, in 1979, is a poster child for those insisting on this kind of deconstruction of Catholic teaching and faith.  The first century equivalent of this award would have been the Judas Iscariot Award for Loyalty in the Church.

     It is, then, a very fair question to ask, "Who is this Archbishop Jean Jadot that he should be so questionably honored?"  And the answer is very interesting and germane to the discussion here:  From 1973 to 1980, Archbishop Jean Jadot was the Apostolic Delegate to the United States for Pope Paul VI, and as such was responsible for the assigning of bishops to the 178 dioceses in this country.  During his time as Apostolic Delegate, 103 bishops and 13 archbishops were assigned.  He was replaced in 1980 by Pope John Paul II, who described Jadot as responsible for "destroying the Catholic Church in the United States."  Even a partial listing of bishops assigned during his tenure reads like a who's who of those involved in promoting the homosexual agenda within the Church, as well as those involved in attempting to minimize the scope and impact of the clergy abuse scandal by protecting pederast priests.  At this point it should come as no surprise that these lists very much overlap one another.  These men are legendary for their commitment to the neo-modernism that has brought about this current crisis by denying the very faith of Jesus Christ upon which the Church is built. This list includes the likes of Bishop Walter Sullivan of Richmond, Va., Archbishop Rembert Weakland of Milwaukee, and Roger Cardinal Mahony of Los Angeles.  Others named during Jadot's tenure were Rochester Bishop Matthew Clark; Albany's Howard Hubbard; former Santa Fe Archbishop Roberto Sanchez, who resigned in a sex scandal; former San Jose Bishop Pierre DuMaine; former Honolulu Bishop Joseph Ferrario; San Antonio Archbishop Patrick Flores; former Newark Archbishop Peter Gerety; Joliet, Ill., Bishop Joseph Imesch; Louisille Archbishop Thomas C. Kelly, O.P., a former staffer at the apostolic nuncio under Jadot; Bernard Cardinal Law of Boston (whom Jadot selected as bishop for Springfield-Cape Girardeau, Mo.), Cincinnati Archbishop Daniel Pilarczyk and Saginaw Bishop Kenneth Untener. 

     In an article entitled "Still Proud Of Bishops He Gave U.S." that he wrote for The Wanderer  in 2002, Paul Likoudis provided the above list and ended it with these comments: "Each of these prelates has been a strong advocate of the pro-homosexual agenda in the U.S. Church, ordaining homosexuals, imposing pro-homosexual education on Catholic schools, aiding and abetting special rights legislation in the civil realm for homosexuals, and giving free rein to homosexuals and lesbians in religious orders which operated schools, universities, parishes, seminaries, and retreat houses in their dioceses and archdioceses."

     It has been well over five years since this article was published, and while some of these men remain in the assignments listed, others have moved on to other things, are retired or have passed away.  I currently reside within the Diocese of Saginaw, which was under the bishopric of Kenneth Untener until his death in  March of 2004. While I never met Bishop Untener personally, I have lived for nearly three years now in the aftermath of his tenure as bishop.  I find nothing in Likoudis' comments that I can disagree with.  In fact, Untener's installation as Bishop of Saginaw was almost quashed by the Vatican due to a pornographic "sexual reassessment" program that he instituted while an administrator at the now defunct St. John's Seminary in Plymouth, Michigan.  He was certainly never shy about promoting a pro-homosexual agenda, and the courage of his convictions was never in any doubt.

     Kenneth Untener is the most polarizing personality I have ever encountered.  Even in death, he is revered and despised with equal ferocity, and the ill will and contempt for the Catholic Faith that characterized his 24 years as bishop is still pervasive within the parishes pastored or administered by the clergy and religious that he left behind.  While the saccharine accolades from his supporters that remain posted on the web describe him as a champion for the downtrodden and a proponent of equality, it should also be noted that this "equality" was in no way extended to those that disagreed with him or his ultraliberal agenda.  To the contrary, while Untener and his minions did not hesitate to decry the "marginalization" of homosexuals, lesbians and women within the Church, they also did not hesitate to marginalize traditional believing Catholics. 

     The result was a shift in the overall demographic of the diocese to the far left, as the persecuted faithful Catholics either learned to keep their mouths shut, attended parishes in neighboring dioceses, or left the Church all together.  The decline in Mass attendance, giving and parish membership during Untener's reign was breathtaking; as much as two thirds or even three quarters in some places.  And all the time this was occurring the Untenerites were pointing to Rome and blaming the "oppressive" nature of the Church as the cause, demanding ever more liberalism to alleviate the "suffering" imposed by traditional Catholicism.  If one did not buy into the entire Untener package, then one was opposed to social justice.  If one promoted saying the Holy Rosary or participating in any traditionally Catholic devotions, then one was too focused on heaven to be a friend to the poor.  The crucifixes and kneelers were removed from the churches and the liturgy became virtually unrecognizable, while the sacraments of Confession and Penance and even the Eucharist became "optional," and the illicitly consecrated Syrian honey-flatbread molded in the tabernacles. 

     While my encounter with the remnants of Untener's Assumption University program in 2005 is detailed elsewhere, it should suffice here to say that it supported, encouraged and indoctrinated the laity to lionize and serve all things Untener, while demonizing and denying the True Catholic Faith.  To this day, there are two religions that are trying to coexist within the Diocese of Saginaw:  The remnants of this "Untenerism" and a return to the more traditionally Catholic expression of the Faith under the new bishop, Robert Carlson.  The tension is palpable.  The lesson being learned in this diocese is that the vast damage of Untener's peculiar brand of spiritual homosexuality, in the guise of a contrived "new" Catholicism that claimed Vatican II as the source of its abominations, is not quickly nor easily undone, let alone healed.  And the Saginaw experience represents only one diocese of the many which are in similar circumstances; seeking to recover true Catholic teaching and Christian unity in the midst of such deep division.


    
Part 3: Down the Yellow Brick Road

     The clergy abuse scandal, along with the highly questionable way that it has been handled by the American hierarchy, has allowed the true nature of this problem, a deep seated and vast homosexual subculture operating within Catholicism, to assume a visibility that can no longer be hidden nor denied.  Currently, as this subculture transforms itself into a counterculture before our very eyes, the level and the intensity of the propaganda coming from the homosexual left has risen to a volume and an intensity that clouds the issues.  This is the intent.  The homosexual infiltration and orientation within the hierarchy has created a situation in which the faithful bishops must be continually watching their backs and do not dare upset the apple cart, regardless of what their own personal convictions and dedication to the faith dictate.  And so the situation within the American Catholic hierarchy is one in which the inmates have assumed control of the asylum.

     The other side of this coin is the current posture of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), which is, essentially, that the issues of clergy sexual abuse and homosexuality within the Church have been addressed and that it is time to put all of this behind us and move on to other more pressing matters.  There is, of course, some merit to this.  However, there is also a definite propaganda aspect to this approach that must be addressed, for it creates the false impression that the most devastating crisis to face the Catholic Church since the Reformation or, perhaps, since the Church emerged from the catacombs has, with a few strokes of the pen, been whisked away into the dust bin of history.  This proves once again the old adage that those things that seem too good to be true usually are. The image of contemporary Catholicism that the bishops would like us to hold in our hearts is that the joy found in our Catholic diversity is like the four friends in the Wizard of Oz as they lock arms and sing and dance their way down the Yellow Brick Road.  They would like us, the laity, to put on our rose colored glasses and trust in their leadership, as they substitute the Emerald City of Oz for St. Augustine's City of God.  In short, if we ignore all of this and keep throwing our envelopes into the basket every week, it will all go away.  While such lay groups as SNAP and Voice of the Faithful continue to pull back the wizard's veil to address unspeakable acts of sodomy, the bishops, by ignoring the situation, instruct us to, "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain."

     As long ago as 2004, then President of the USCCB, Bishop Wilton Gregory was proclaiming the "scandal is history."  In April of 2003, Marci A. Hamilton, a legal writer whose expertise is religious law, detailed what she called "Act Three" of the clergy abuse scandal:  The Catholic Church's concerted efforts, using various theories of the interpretation of the First Amendment, to manipulate the legal and legislative process in the United States to resist discovery, block reform to aid abuse victims, and resist reforms that would prevent the same kind of nightmare from occurring in the future.  According to Hamilton, it is the goal of the Catholic Church to be positioned in such a way legally as to preclude any such scandal ever coming to light again.  From this perspective, Bishop Gregory's claim that the "scandal is history" takes on a far different meaning than originally intended.   The revelations that have come to light since this time, particularly those involving Gregory's successor, Francis Cardinal George, as well as the vast sums of money that continue to be paid out  to settle past claims prove this scandal to be anything but history.  If it is true that the 12,000 victims that have been identified so far actually represent as little as 6 percent of the potential total, then the clergy abuse scandal is not only a very present reality, but may continue to be so well into the foreseeable future.  Unless, of course, the Catholic Church can have it legislated out of existence.

     On November 29, 2005, the Congregation for Catholic Education issued a document entitled, "Instruction Concerning the Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations With Regard to Persons With Homosexual Tendencies in View of Their Admission to the Seminary and to Sacred Orders."  This document reinforced the teaching of the Church that persons with "deep-seated homosexual tendencies" are "objectively disordered," and stated in no uncertain terms that the Church "cannot admit to the seminary or to holy orders those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called 'gay culture.'"  This document did not break any new ground or explore any new territory.  It simply restated what had been written in the Church's last previous document on the subject, which was issued in 1961.  Like this previous document, the seminaries in the United States have simply chosen to ignore it.  To be sure, Catholic seminaries do not exclude candidates based on a homosexual orientation.   The one possible exception to this is worth mentioning: St. Charles Borremeo Seminary in Philadelphia.  University of St. Mary of the Lake, IL, a.k.a. Mundelein Seminary, famous for its "Catwalk," a hallway of preening and fashionable homosexuals, accepts students with a homosexual orientation, but not those who admit to frequenting gay bars.  However, while in seminary and after ordination, all students are expected to remain celibate.   Since Pope John Paul II ordered the seminaries of the United States "cleaned up" in May, 2004, it is estimated that the percentage of homosexuals in these institutions remains unchanged or, perhaps, has actually increased, as estimates range from as low as 30 percent to as high as 70 percent. 

     Prior to the issuance of this instruction, in September of 2005, a much heralded "visitation" of the seminaries was announced, ostensibly as a fact finding mission.  One of the stated goals of this visitation was to determine the extent to which homosexuality was a factor in Catholic seminary education.  The question that garnered the most attention at the time was, "Is there evidence of homosexuality in the seminary?"  Since these visitations were conducted by 117 bishops accompanied by seminary personnel this seems, in retrospect, somewhat naive.  In actuality, the goal was merely to convey the message that only homosexuals with the "right stuff" should be considered for ordination.  Father Stephen J. Rossetti put it this way, "Certainly someone who has a problematic history of sexual acting out, or an orientation that is so powerfully homosexual that it really overshadows the person's relational life, then those would not be appropriate people for priesthood."  The goal never was to uphold the Church's teaching on homosexuality as would be restated in the forthcoming instruction:  the goal was to tell the homosexuals in the seminaries that it was time to clean up their public behavior so as to draw no further attention to themselves.  Msgr. Francis J. Maniscalco, communications secretary of the USCCB, shrugged off the homosexuality question as "just relevant to the current time in which we live."  In an article for Catholic News Service, Jerry Filteau said of Msgr. Maniscalco, "He cited recent trends in gay rights advocacy, more tolerance of a gay lifestyle and arguments that homosexual and heterosexual relations are equivalent."  So much for Catholic teaching.  Of the 56 questions posed to the seminaries, only one even pertained to the subject of homosexuality,  and that is the one which is quoted above.

     In an article written for the February, 2006 issue of First Things, Father Richard John Neuhaus referred to this widespread rejection of the Vatican instruction on homosexuals in the priesthoood as the "Truce of 2005."  In doing so, he compared it to the "Truce of 1968," a term coined to describe the Vatican's reaction to the same kind of open rebellion following the publication of Pope Paul VI's encyclical Humane Vitae.  When Patrick Cardinal O'Boyle, then archbishop of Washington D.C., had attempted to discipline those who had openly rejected the teaching of the encyclical, the pope intervened and decided to allow this dissident reaction to stand rather than risk schism.  Father Neuhaus argues that by allowing dissent to go unchallenged in 1968, the Vatican set a precedent and created an atmosphere in which the magisterial teaching of the Church is open to the critique of local church authorities and -- in this case -- the open repudiation of what the Church believes and teaches concerning homosexuality and its role within the Catholic priesthood.  Even among conservative Catholics the mantra has become, "heresy is better than schism," though it should be noted that unchecked heresy is a cancer that eats at the very foundations of the faith, and schism is an option ultimately chosen by the schismatic.  Perhaps the question that begs to be asked is, "Whatever became of good, old fashioned excommunication?"
             
     A year later, on November 14, 2006, the USCCB published "Ministry to Persons with Homosexual Inclinations," a much anticipated document that made such a concerted effort to be "middle of the road" that it managed to generate controversey from all directions.  While encouraging parish participation and stating that persons of a homosexual inclination had full rights to ministry, the document drew the expected shrill ire of the homosexual community by insisting that homosexual acts were sinful and that chastity was necessary for homosexuals to maintain a state of grace.  Conversely, Catholic physicians and psychiatrists objected to the fact that "...the truths that medical/psychological science has discovered about homosexuality… In particular, the health risks inherent in the lifestyle and the real grounds for hope of recovery and healing are never mentioned in the document."  In actuality, the response to the document was largely rhetorical.  While the chastity  promoting organization "Courage" along with it's sister support group "Encourage" were specifically mentioned and recommended, the pro-homosexual Dignity USA commented that "They speak in willful ignorance about homosexuality — sexuality in general. They are continuing to discriminate against us." 

     Meanwhile, Sr. Jeannine Gramick, the outspoken pro-homosexual activist and co-founder of New Ways Ministry, was busy accepting the Mother Teresa Award from the St. Bernadette Institute of Sacred Art in Albuquerque, New Mexico.  Along with her sidekick, homosexual priest Fr. Robert Nugent, Gramick continues to be a vocal leader promoting a homosexual agenda within the Catholic Church, including the ordination of openly homosexual  men and women to the priesthood. This is done despite a direct order from the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith banning both from "any pastoral work involving homosexual persons."  Like the document on vocations and this directive from Rome, the "Ministry" document also proved to be much ado about nothing, as it, too, was ignored.

     How could this be?  Catholic writer Randy Engel reported on the November, 2006 USCCB meeting in Baltimore that introduced the "Ministry to Persons with Homosexual Inclinations" document as a "Dog and Pony Show" staged by the "progressive" Am-Church arm of the USCCB in celebration of all things liberal, in particularly the promotion of homosexuality.  Despite the conventional language regarding homosexual acts as sinful, essentially a bone thrown to the more traditional Catholics, the document was, nonetheless, "gay friendly" and produced nothing that would in any way threaten or impede the progress of Dignity USA, New Ways Ministry or any of the other  pro homosexual ministries with links to USCCB staffers, officials and sympathetic bishops.  Ms. Engel describes these "ministries" in this way:

The most important thing the reader needs to remember about Dignity, New Ways, NACDLGM and other so-called “gay” Catholic ministries is that despite their religious trappings, these organizations are essentially political not religious. They are not “ministries” in the traditional sense of the word. Their objectives are ideological and political in nature and they are designed to extend and strengthen the hold of the Homosexual Collective on the Catholic Church in America and to secure its vast resources for their own ends.

“Gay” ministries transform parishes into political and propaganda cells for “gay” activism. They undermine authentic Church teachings on Faith and morals.

“Gay” ministries systematically strip parishioners of every vestige of natural revulsion that the normal person experiences when initially confronted by sexual perversion. Rather than helping the homosexual extricate himself from the vice to which he has become habituated, “gay” ministries confirm the homosexual in his sin and bind him ever tighter to the Homosexual Collective which frowns upon defectors. “Gay” ministries re-cruit like the Army, especially among vulnerable youth. “Gay” ministries have gone to great lengths to cover up the historical fact that pederasty, that is, sexual acts between an adult male and a minor male, has been the most universal and pervasive form of homosexuality from ancient to modern times.

In a number of liberal dioceses, “gay” ministries have been instrumental in establishing “gay” parishes, that is, parishes that cater almost exclusively to a sexually-active “gay” clientele.

      Most Holy Redeemer Parish in the Archdiocese of San Francisco which is located in the “gay” Castro District of the city, recently made national headlines when news leaked out that the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, a group of homosexual drag queens nationally known for their anti-Catholic antics and blasphemous parodies, had secured MHR parish hall for a salacious night of revival bingo and homo-sex hosted by he/she Peaches Christ, a drag queen freak-nick who claims to be a descendant of Jesus Christ. Each year MHR participates in the annual Gay Pride Parade, and “gay” speakers and activists regularly use the pulpit and other parish facilities to promote their “gay” theology.

        By Randy Engel:  Excerpted from “The Latest USCCB Dog and Pony Show”

     Randy Engel is best known for her landmark work on the history of homosexuality within the Catholic Church entitled Rite of Sodomy: Homosexuality and the Roman Catholic Church, which was published in 2006.  This is easily the most exhaustive and comprehensive study of this subject ever attempted, containing 1318 pages, 4,523 endnotes, and a bibliography of over 350 books.  It is an unflinching examination of this distatsteful subject that begins with the pederasty of the far ancient world, progresses through Greco-Roman times, and traces the history of this age old perversion through the Middle Ages, Renaissance, and Modern worlds down to our day.  It traces the homosexual legacy in the Catholic hierarchy in the United States over the past 100 years through the lives and homosexual times of such notables as William Cardinal O’Connell of Boston and Francis Cardinal Spellman of New York, and provides a history of the "homosexualization" of Am-Church and the special case of Joseph Cardinal Bernardin.   The scope of this work and the meticulous documentation provided make it hard to argue against the profound nature of the current crisis that confronts the Catholic Church.    

    

Part 4: The Smoke of Satan

     The dangers inherent in this situation are obvious and sobering.  Both the Vatican and the USCCB issue documents, instructions and statements that are openly ignored and defied, and this takes place with no further comment nor repercussion.  Clearly, the expectation is that if right or, at least, right sounding statements are made, and documents are issued that seemingly address these critical situations, then the laity can be counted on to ask no questions and assume that the blind trust that they have put in Church leadership is well founded.  The depth and breadth of this present crisis proves conclusively that this has, indeed, been anything but a fair assumption.  The true nature of this crisis, then, goes beyond the clergy abuse scandal.  It goes beyond the all too easily documented fact of a deeply entrenched and vast homosexual network that has made this scandal possible.  It goes beyond the culture of sin within the Church that subverts the Christian gospel of salvation through the shed Precious Blood of Jesus Christ in favor of a false and worldly gospel based on a liberal agenda that accepts, condones and encourages the most perverted expressions of human sexuality.  These are merely the symptoms.  The disease that these symptoms indicate is a deep and rapidly spreading spiritual infection that we must be bold enough to call by its proper name: satanic evil.

     The mention of the name "Satan" results in rolled eyes and snickering within the ranks of the liberal Catholics.  To the Catholic priests of the homosexual left Satan is a symbol, "That name that we use to refer to human evil."  I've actually heard that one incorporated into the liturgy.  And, since human evil in the world of the militant homosexuals is defined by those "homophobes" who would actually agree with Catholic teaching that such inclinations are "intrinsically disordered," then Satan becomes anyone who would dare disagree with the pro-homosexual agenda of Am-Church.  Left is right and right is wrong, black is white and white is black, up is down and down is up in the topsy-turvy world of the neo-modernist radical "Catholics."

     Because this is so, this would, perhaps, be a good time to review just what Catholic teaching is concerning the Prince of Darkness, Satan, Mesostopheles, Lucifer, Old Nick, Old Clooty, or he that goes by any other such name that means "the devil."  The Catholic Encyclopedia entry on the devil  is quite exhaustive and certainly too extensive to reproduce here, so suffice it to say that in no way in orthodox Catholic teaching is Satan ever portrayed as, or ever considered in anyway to be, a symbol or metaphor for evil.  To the contrary, he is portrayed as he is in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible: 

How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, who didst rise in the morning?  How art thou fallen to the earth, that didst wound the nations? And thou saidst in thy heart: I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will sit in the mountain of the covenant, in the sides of the north. I will ascend above the height of the clouds, I will be like the most High.  But yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, into the depth of the pit. 
(Isaiah 14:12-15)

You are of your father the devil: and the desires of your father you will do.  He was a murderer from the beginning: and he stood not in the truth, because truth is not in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father thereof.   (John 8:44)

And there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels: and they prevailed not, neither was their place found any more in heaven.  And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduceth the whole world; and he was cast unto the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.  (Revelation 12:7-9) 

     There is, perhaps, no greater sign of the times in which we live than that we must remind oursleves that Satan is real.  He is a living, intelligent and highly active personality. He is fallen from heaven for attempting to rise to the heights of God Himself.  He kills and he lies and he deceives.  He and his minions remain at war with God, which forms the background to all the vile and wicked things they do on earth, for it was into our midst that they  were thrown down.  He is the seducer of the world, who sends his spirits, Incubus and Succubus, to play upon the wanton sexual desires of men and women, to lure them into the mortal sins of fornication and adultery so that he might draw them into hell with him.  And, when he reverses these spirits, and Incubus becomes Succubus and Succubus becomes Incubus, then this is called "homosexuality" and it is the mortal sin that is inherent to the so called "gay and lesbian" lifestyle, and those that practice this abomination are also drawn into hell with him, for sin is sin and it plays no favorites.  To those that would claim Satan as a mere symbol or metaphor, I dare you to look at the world around you and tell me that you do not see countless souls possessed of these twin demons of seduction, Incubus and Succubus.  And to those that dare to look with unflinching and honest eye upon the holy and ancient Church of Jesus Christ, can anyone deny that too many of those that are entrusted with the very  life of Mother Church Herself are just as possessed of these twin demons, Succubus and Incubus, as is the world itself? 

     Neither the idea that homosexuality is a form of demonic possession nor that Satan has established a real presence within the Catholic Church are new or novel ideas outside the ranks of the liberals, who, for that matter, deny the supernatural reality of even the resurrection.  The point is that the crisis confronting the Catholic Church cannot be viewed realistically as either a sociological or political problem, as some would infer or insist. It is a spiritual crisis and it is deep, dark, dirty and profound.

     The purpose here has been to establish and document the fact of a vast and highly influential homosexual community which exists within the Catholic Church, and which has been instrumental in establishing and enforcing an agenda that is counter to and subverts true Catholic teaching: the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I believe that this has been established beyond any reasonable doubt.  In light of this true Catholic teaching, it can be extrapolated that those embracing this homosexual lifestyle must be doing so under either the direct, or indirect, influence of Satan, who seeks as his primary goal on earth the total destruction of the Body of Jesus Christ: The True, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church and we, her children.

     For those that believe this explanation too gothic, consider that one common trait of homosexual bishops and priests is the removal of crucifixes. Who finds the crucifix so distasteful that they cannot stand before it?  Vampires?  Werewolves?  Satanists?  It is a short and distinct list.  Ask yourself, where is the allegiance of a bishop that would remove the kneelers from the churches and instruct the faithful to stand and not to kneel before the Cross and the altar of God in the Mass?  Ask yourself also, then, where the loyalties are of the priest that, when his new bishop orders the kneelers returned and the kneeling resumed, refuses to do so until the last possible moment when compliance becomes a mandatory obligation?  I have witnessed these things myself.  So, if homosexuality is a sociological issue akin to racial discrimination, and a political issue addressed as a violation of civil rights; if the Catholic Church is merely behind these scientific times and out of step with the realities of the 21st century, then why do these things matter to them at all? 

     Why do they so hate the Rosary that they discourage it at every turn and belittle and ostracize those who are devoted to it?  The answer we are looking for to this question is from the Blessed Mother herself, who told Alan de la Roche:  "Know, my son, and make all others know, that it is a probable and proximate sign of eternal damnation to have an aversion, a lukewarmness, or a negligence in saying the Angelical Salutation, which has repaired the whole world."  And it is St. Louis De Montfort that further explains, "But we have also the experience of several ages; for it has always been remarked that those who wear the outward sign of reprobation, like all impious heretics and proud worldlings, hate or despise the Hail Mary and the Rosary.  Heretics still learn and say the Our Father, but not the Hail Mary nor the Rosary.  They abhor it; they would rather wear a serpent than a Rosary." (True Devotion to Mary, St. Louis De Montfort - no. 250)   
    
     There are a myriad of secular pro-homosexual organizations and endless opportunities for social interaction that do not require contrived theological arguments nor manipulated Biblical exegesis to justify their existence, and which would, therefore, provide a much more naturally conducive environment to the conduct of homosexual activity.  Should religion really be the issue, there are any number of liberal Protestant denominations that are receptive to homosexual "Christians."  And while the historical evidence shows that homosexuality has been a reality within Catholicism since very early times, it also shows that it has, without exception, been confined to the seamy underground of the Church and consistently and publicly condemned as sin.  The current historical phenomenon that we are witnessing in which homosexuality has risen from the spiritual sewer of Catholicism to assume a prominent, controlling and even respected role within the ranks of the clergy, religious orders and hierarchy is a paradigm shift that indicates a different and more dynamic real presence of Satan within the Church, and this creates a situation that cannot and must not be ignored, let alone denied.

     On June 29, 1972, Pope Paul VI made one of the most famous and controversial claims of Satanic presence within the Church:  During his homily at the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, the pontiff uttered these words or words to this effect:

We believed that after the Council would come a day of sunshine in the history of the Church. But instead there has come a day of clouds and storms, and of darkness ... And how did this come about? We will confide to you the thought that may be, we ourselves admit in free discussion, that may be unfounded, and that is that there has been a power, an adversary power. Let us call him by his name: the devil. It is as if from some mysterious crack, no, it is not mysterious, from some crack the smoke of satan has entered the temple of God.

     The controversy about this quote has ranged from the exact wording to whether or not the words were uttered at all, though the doubt of this seems removed by the fact that the quote has been located, in Italian, on the Vatican website.  More controversial has been the interpretation of what the pope meant when he spoke these words.  The legendary and outspoken Jesuit, Father Malachi Martin, insisted that the meaning was quite literal, and was insisting on a link between Satanism and clerical sexual sin as early as 1990: "The cultic acts of Satanic pedophilia in the Catholic Church are considered by professionals to be the culmination of the rites of 'The Enthronement of the Fallen Archangel Lucifer' in the Vatican."  Father Martin, one of the Catholic Church's foremost experts on exorcism, a noted scholar, and a novelist  who wrote prolific and thinly veiled accounts of  the evils present within his beloved Catholic Church until his death in 1999, believed this enthronement rite had taken place in 1963.  Father Martin was also one of the circle of Church insiders claiming that the famous "Third Secret" of Fatima was a message prophesying the rise of this apostasy within the hierarchy of the Church.  He also affirmed the Bayside, New York apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary, stating uncategorically that he had come to believe in their authenticity. 

        The Bayside Prophecies, as they are called, are the result of a series of apparitions or "visitations" received by Veronica Lueken, a Long Island, New York housewife.  These alleged appearances of not only "Our Lady of the Roses," the same manifestation of the Blessed Mother that occurred at Fatima, Portugal in 1917, but of Jesus as well, took place from 1968 until shortly before Veronica's death in 1995. 

     Veronica Lueken is without question the most controversial Catholic mystic of the 20th century.  Yet, it is now, as these revelations of another time slowly recede into history, that they have taken on a new and ever more haunting significance.  As stated at the outset, we have all become accustomed to the reality of the clergy sexual abuse scandal and the proliferation of homosexuality throughout the priesthood, religious orders and hierarchy of the Catholic Church.  This is old news to most of us at this point in time.  However, when we realize that these themes, themes which have become so much a part of the every day reality of Catholics as we approach the close of the first decade of the 21st century, were the themes of the prophecies received by Veronica Lueken at a time when we (including Veronica herself) were blissfully ignorant of such things, it becomes reason enough to take another look at the Bayside Prophecies and their significance for our day and the difficult days that lie ahead.

     The Bayside revelations revolve around the central message that Our Lady of Fatima has returned to warn of impending chastisement from heaven if these final warnings are not heeded and the evils revealed addressed and redressed according to the will of God.  The key to understanding the plight of mankind in this present time is found in the failure of the Catholic Church to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart, and in the refusal of the popes to reveal the enigmatic Third Secret of Fatima, which was given to the Fatima seer Lucy, with the instruction that it be revealed to the world in 1960.  During the quarter century that these prophecies were received, the ills and evils of the Church, resulting from a loss of the True Faith of Jesus Christ, were meticulously detailed to Veronica in visions and locutions that are both frightening and profound.  It was Veronica's practice to record these messages as they happened, and these tapes, in turn, formed the core of the These Last Days  radio program.  I first heard this program many years ago when driving my trusty 1966 Buick Special through the night on a remote and lonely highway in northern Michigan.  To this day, I vividly remember the unnerving effect of Veronica's slightly hysterical and, at the same time, soul searing and sincere delivery.  It was hard to deny the impression that she was, indeed, viewing something of a heavenly and terrifying profundity.

     Accordingly, the unrevealed Third Secret concerned the entry of Satan into the Catholic Church.  Father Malachi Martin became convinced of the authenticity of Bayside when he learned that the Third Secret, as revealed to Veronica, was the Third Secret that he knew to be the truth from having read it for himself during the course of his tenure as a confidant to three different popes.  As Veronica reported it:
My child, they converse of the secret that I gave at Fatima. It is a simple explanation. It could not be fully revealed because of the drastic nature of My message. How I warned and warned that satan would enter into the highest realms of the hierarchy in Rome. The Third Secret, My child, is that satan would enter into My Son's Church.  (Our Lady, May 13, 1978 )
    
     Some of the Bayside Prophecies are eerily prophetic of our current situation, especially given the dates when they were received.  Such as these that purport to be from Jesus Himself:
I am your God, and I say unto you:  continue to change My Church and you will fall!  You will build a secular church, bringing in all--even heretics, even homosexuals.  All aberrations condemned by the Eternal Father, you will permit in the name of humanism.  Nay, no!  I say unto you as your God.  You will be given a short reign, for I consider you then an abomination, and as such you will be removed. (Jesus, May 23, 1979)

I will not stand for My priests who condone homosexuality and allow it in My priesthood!  I will not stand for My priests who allow the murder of the unborn with their permissiveness!  I will not stand by and allow My priesthood to be destroyed! My child, I did not mean to affrighten you.  I was giving vent to the hurt of My Heart.  But I wish to bring across to mankind that I, too, can no longer allow these--the carnalities, the abominations that men are committing upon earth to continue.  My hand is coming down and it will strike!
(Jesus, June 18, 1982)

     Or these from Our Lady:

The hierarchy has been infiltrated by agents of hell. Many have come posing as angels of light, but with darkness of heart and dark secrets.  (Our Lady, May 30, 1977)

And many of these wolves are shepherds parading as angels of light, bringing doctrines of devils into My Son's House and schools. It will be bishop against bishop and cardinal against cardinal, and satan will set himself in their midst. Like a game of chess, he manipulates for his benefit, not mankind. Like a game of chess, he will play cardinal against cardinal and bishop against bishop. (Our Lady, May 18, 1977)
    
     For obvious reasons, the Bayside apparitions remain unapproved by the Vatican, having never been investigated, and were, in fact, condemned without an investigation by the local ordinary at the time, Bishop Mugavero.  Described as a "staunch liberal" in his time, the bishop's actions and motivations are, perhaps, brought into sharper focus when it is noted that he was quoted on the home page of New Ways Ministry in support of the Vatican condemned pro homosexuality agenda of Sr. Jeannine Gramick and Fr. Robert Nugent.   Since this essay was originally published, this quote has been removed.  However, as reported in the New York Daily News article, "Priest-Sex Suit Seeks $300 Million from Brooklyn Diocese," published on October 16, 2002, Bishop Mugavero was implicated in the cover up of a vast priest sex abuse scandal.  This article by Barbara Ross and Dave Goldiner contains the following quote which also helps to explain Mugavero's motivations: 

Attorney Michael Dowd [who filed the suit on behalf of the alleged victims] also dropped a bombshell accusation: That Bishop Francis Mugavero, Daily's predecessor, ignored the abuse allegations because he was gay.  Dowd charged at a press conference yesterday that Mugavero, who died in 1991, was "living in a glass house" and feared that his own sexual relationships with adult men might become public if he cracked down on abusive priests.  That allegation was not in the court papers.

     It is not my purpose here to argue the cause of authenticity and/or Church approval for Veronica Lueken and the Bayside Prophecies.  However, given the nature of the messages and the dates when they were received, juxtaposed to the fact that the rank and file Catholic faithful had virtually no clue that such perversion existed within the Catholic clergy and hierarchy until the clergy abuse scandal became public knowledge in 2002, then it may not be prudent to dismiss Bayside out of hand with the same cavalier ease that the Church has displayed.  Perhaps it is, indeed, time to pay more attention to the man behind the curtain.  The issue, after all, is not if the Bayside apparitions are legitimate but, rather, that so much of the message communicated can now be verified by earthly and mundane sources.  This, in and of itself, should provide reason enough to consider the prophecies that remain unfulfilled.  These prophecies foretell a great and horrible chastisement by fire that will fall upon the earth and, more specifically, the apostate Catholic Church.  Time, of course, will tell, and if Bayside should prove to be a legitimate manifestation of Our Lady, then the message is abundantly clear: this time grows short.

Conclusion:  "Cut to the Heart"

     When I first became involved in the research that is presented here, it was in an attempt to answer for myself questions that plagued me concerning the condition of the Catholic Faith here in the Diocese of Saginaw.  I was frustrated by priests and religious that were in open rebellion against the Catholic Church, belittled or ignored the sacraments, and perverted the liturgy to the maximum that the bishop would allow.  The most sacrilegious and blasphemous things I have ever heard in my life have come from the religious and clergy in this diocese.  When my former parish priest informed me that he was considering teaching a course for the parish faithful on the gnostic Gospel of Thomas, I suggested that I would like to teach a course, then, on the Gospel of John.  I was told that the canonical, New Testament gospels were actually false gospels (especially John, which was actually a gnostic text, he assured me) and that the gnostic texts were far more historically accurate and should be considered more authoritative.  I was told that, in his opinion, the disciples of Jesus, the apostles, were "a bunch of idiots" and that what they taught should be routinely disregarded. 

     This combination of ignorance and arrogance was the final straw.  I was angered and frustrated to such a degree that I ultimately decided to leave the Catholic Church.  When I located the remnant of my Mennonite ancestors in a community some 100 miles from here, I took my family out of the Catholic Church and we began driving to attend the Mennonite church there.  We did this throughout the summer of 2007, and gave God every opportunity to move us to this community and establish a new life in which we could pursue Christian ministry without all of the sin and madness that we had encountered in the Diocese of Saginaw.  The church we attended was faithful, the pastor, elders and congregation warm and welcoming, and I have never felt so much at home as I did there.  However, every attempt we made at moving was thwarted by what could only be divine intervention, and by the time fall was turning into winter, it was clear that this was not in God's plan for us.

     I prayed mightily about all of this, and when the answer came, it was not what I expected.  I was given a vision in which I saw myself huddling my wife and two children and moving away from a Catholic Church that was ablaze, engulfed in flames.  I looked back over my shoulder to see if Jesus had made it out, and there He was:  first on the Cross at the back of the sanctuary and then at the door, standing in a white robe, the sleeves of which were being stained by the blood from the wounds in His hands.  The look on His face was the saddest expression I have ever seen.  I knew then and there that He would never leave His Church, the one that He Himself had founded,  the one He calls His Bride, though she burns with the flame of every sinful human passion and plays the harlot with the world, while mocking Him as He looks on at her filth and fornication.  In an instant, I knew just how very real the Real Presence of Jesus actually is.  And, in that instant, I was cut to the heart and my spirit was rekindled in the Church.  His Church -- and mine. 

    It is not my expectation that anyone should act upon or even consider the validity of my own private revelation.  Church teaching is very clear on this.  However, it is my expectation that every believing soul who is aware of the eternal truth of God, that we are redeemed through His only Son, Jesus Christ, and by His Precious Blood shed on the Cross of Calvary for the remission of our sins, and that this truth is communicated to the world in the fullness of faith and through time by the Holy Catholic Church, should be aware of the ongoing and profound crisis that confronts this very Church as outlined above.  It is, further, my expectation that any faithful son or daughter of Mother Church who has any doubts concerning what is presented here will conduct this same kind of research and, should the conclusions prove different, will admonish and correct me, and the others I have cited, accordingly.  However, should the conclusions be the same, then I direct your attention to Canon 212 of the Code of Canon Law of the Roman Catholic Church which reads, in part, as follows:      
   
In accord with the knowledge, competence and preeminence which they possess, [the Christian faithful] have the right and even at times a duty to manifest to the sacred pastors their opinion on matters which pertain to the good of the Church, and they have a right to make their opinion known to the other Christian faithful, all with due regard for the integrity of faith and morals and reverence toward their pastors and with consideration for the common good and the dignity of persons.

     The instruction is clear, and so it is my admonition to you to proceed accordingly by making your position on these matters known to your priest, bishop and others within the hierarchy who need to be aware that, as a Catholic lay person, it is your right and, in this instance, your duty to demand that Catholic moral and social teaching be followed according to the magisterium and the vows these individuals have taken to uphold it.  As noted at the outset, it is only when the laity assumes responsibility for the Church and understands that blame for the sins committed in her name rests with all of us, that  we have any right to hold the clergy and hierarchy accountable for their actions.  The most powerful person in the Church is neither bishop, cardinal nor even pope.  It is the Catholic faithful who knows the faith, practices it according to the teachings of the Church, and exerts the reasonable expectation that our leaders will do likewise.

     Finally, it must be noted that this work is in no way intended to be a condemnation of any particular individual.  To the contrary, it is written in the full knowledge that we are all sinners and that we have all fallen short of God's glory, just as St. Paul has instructed us in Romans 3:23.   However, we are as individuals, and the Church is as an institution, required to admonish the sinner as we seek to bring ourselves and all others into proper relationship with God.  As Bishop Louis Morrow writes in My Catholic Faith :
Whenever we think our words may have a good effect, we should not hesitate to admonish the erring prudently. Those in authority ...are bound to admonish those under them of their faults, even if in doing so they bring trouble upon themselves.
    
To be sure, the worst that we can do, regardless of our intention, is to allow this sin of homosexuality to go unchecked and to believe, as so many of even our most well-meaning bishops do, that if it is just ignored  -- if we merely stand at truce with the strident and vocal homosexual cabal within our midst -- that all will somehow be well, and that this approach is, in some perverse way, even pastoral.  I leave these bishops with not my words but those of Our Lady of the Roses:
I ask you not to remain silent when you meet with wrongdoing, but to speak out and act to correct a situation that is offensive to your God and destructive to your soul. 
(Our Lady, November 20, 1979)


 

Appendix:

The Roots of the Scandal

A homosexual subculture, developing for years in American seminaries, has replaced traditional moral teaching with humanistic psychological theory.

By Michael S. Rose

July 4, 2002

Excerpts pertaining to former Diocese of Saginaw Bishop Kenneth Untener:

The use of sexually explicit textbooks that undermine teaching on sexual morality was part of a wider program of "sexual reassessment" or desensitization that seminarians were forced to undergo during their formation for the holy priesthood. At the same time Father Kosnik was teaching seminarians at St. John's in Michigan (attended by seminarians from all dioceses in that state), sexually explicit movies were shown to seminarians as a part of morality course. Fathers Kenneth Untener and Robert Rose were seminary administrators at the time. (Father Untener was named Bishop of Saginaw in 1980 and Father Rose was named Bishop of Gaylord in 1981, and later Bishop of Grand Rapids.) Shortly after the Vatican announced that Untener was going to lead the Saginaw diocese, the Detroit Free Press and the National Catholic Register reported that he was summoned to Rome to explain his seminary program. With the help of Detroit's John Cardinal Dearden, he apparently argued successfully in his own defense.

According to Detroit priest Father Eduard Perrone, the "porno flicks" were shown at the seminary as part of a class on morality. "They showed a man masturbating, a woman masturbating, couples copulating, homosexuals humping," he recalled. The crudely produced films, he said, were supposedly put together by doctors who worked for clinical sex study institutes. "There were ladies in the class too," he explained, "because at that time they were already teaching seminarians and laity together."


Several Detroit-area priests recalled the widespread homosexual promiscuity during the 1980s at St. John's Provincial Seminary in Plymouth, Michigan. They described their seminary as a "veritable hothouse" for the gay subculture. Said one of the priests: "Everyone there knew what was going on. There were visits at night as gay seminarians cruised from room to room." Little effort was made to hide either the sexual orientation or the homosexual activity of the seminarians at St. John's, and, he added, "it was not uncommon to see seminarians acting out in a fairly public setting."

Another controversial sex-ed textbook used widely in US seminaries was written by a Detroit priest, Father Anthony Kosnik. Published first in 1976, Human Sexuality: New Directions in American Catholic Thought takes the same desensitizing approach to sexual morality as the textbooks used as the Dallas and Oregon seminaries. Although billed as a "handbook for confessors," it more accurately amounts to a broad attack on Catholic Church teaching. Father Kosnik's book even endured the wrath of the Vatican, which formally denounced it in a rare statement issued by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Of the countless criticisms of the book, perhaps the pithiest came from Msgr. Hubert Maino, former editor of The Michigan Catholic, who said on a local radio talk show that it was "soft on bestiality." Father Kosnik, who taught at St. John's Provincial Seminary in Michigan until 1982, maintained that Catholics must jettison the view that holds fornication, adultery, homosexuality, sodomy, and bestiality to be intrinsically evil acts. He also wrote that priests must understand that "God is surely present" in homosexual relations that are marked by "sincere affection."

From Goodbye, Good Men: an excerpt pertaining to Our Lady of the Lake or "Mundelein" seminary:

"One hall in the seminary dorm," related Kellenyi, is nicknamed the 'Catwalk,' known as the residence of the more fashionable gays."  "Catwalk," he explained was a reference to the runways of fashion models, but also reflected the campy, feline-like personalities of those who lived in this area of the seminary." [1]