Monstrance with Host stolen in Spain

This is a dreadful story. CNS reports.

Monstrance with Blessed Sacrament stolen from parish in Spain

Madrid, Spain, Feb 15, 2011 / 04:09 pm (CNA/Europa Press).- Two individuals stole a monstrance containing the Blessed Sacrament from a parish located in Majadahonda, a suburb of Madrid, Spain.

Fr. Juan Francisco Perez, the parish pastor of St. Catherine’s, said the incident occurred at 6 p.m. on Feb. 11. He told Europa Press that two individuals grabbed the monstrance and left.

Police confirmed that the monstrance was indeed stolen and that an investigation is under way.

Fr. Perez said police dusted for fingerprints at the parish and were given descriptions by witnesses who were present at the Church.

This was not the first time the parish has been the target of such incidents. “On Christmas Eve somebody set fire to the main door,” Fr. Perez added.

Mayor Narciso de Foxa of Majadahonda expressed solidarity with Fr. Perez and his parishioners, saying he is “profoundly indignant” over the “attack,” which demonstrates “the intolerance of these people.”

“We will continue to work until we discover who is behind such grave acts that are disrespectful to all Catholics,” he promised.

Anti-Catholic, or drug addicts, or Satanists, or just plain crazy.

Pray for the people and do penance in reparation for the sacrilege.

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27 Comments

  1. Mike says:

    This is very sad. I will pray.

    I hope this doesn’t occur at my parish. We have one day a week in which Our Lord is exposed on the altar in a monstance. No sign up. Who ever is there, is there, and sometimes, well, there is no one there. Any one could walk in and walk away with Our Lord.

    We need lots of pray for these kinds of abuses.

  2. Ceile De says:

    Thnak God that would not happen in our Cathedral in Los Angeles – the Host is never displayed in a Monstrance and if worshippers cannot find where they have hidden the Tabernacle, there is no reason to believe thieves could either.

  3. Dirichlet says:

    Oh, Spain. Have you forgotten what happened in the 1930s?

    This worries me. Not a good presage. I’ll keep this beautiful country in my prayers.

  4. James Joseph says:

    I groan from the depths of my soul.

  5. Animadversor says:

    Ceile De:

    Malum quidem nullum esse sine aliquo bono.

  6. JKnott says:

    Visits to the Blessed Sacrament. The nine First Fridays in reparation! Or any form of reparation.

  7. Father G says:

    Ceile De,

    You are mistaken.

    Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament with a monstrance does take place at the LA cathedral. The doors of the tabernacle are opened and the monstrance is placed within the niche located inside. I know this because I have seen it myself.

  8. Rob Cartusciello says:

    Our parish had the Tabernacle stolen several years ago. Interestingly, the thief took pains to remove the Blessed Sacrament first and lay it to the side of the altar.

    It is not unlikely that a former altar boy committed the crime. Even is his sin, he took the time to show reverence to the Sacrament.

    I will do a Litany of the Holy Name for reparation.

  9. justMe says:

    Did a little digging: apparently there are more than fifty and up to one hundred satanic sects in Spain, the most dangerous are Los Adoradores de Seth (‘Seth’s Lovers’) aka Amigos de Lucifer (Lucifer’s Friends). This group is known for its kidnappings, sexual abuses and assassinations.
    Wouldn’t rule out more of these events taking place in the run up to 2012 which is the Y2K for the occult crowd.
    Will pray for these deluded souls.

  10. Supertradmum says:

    justMe,

    Deluded is a soft word. The Satanists believe in what we believe in-that Jesus is God and Man and that Satan is a damned angel. They chose the damned angel to adore.

  11. digdigby says:

    Satanists? Drug Addicts? If it was just a theft, maybe. But Satanists don’t burn church doors. It starts with ‘M’ and no its not Mouseketeers or Mennonites.

  12. Supertradmum says:

    digdigby,

    Could be, as there is a “settlement process” problem as well as a secular problem in Spain.

  13. Elizabeth D says:

    This is very dreadful. I have the thought that here we see anew the scandal of the Incarnation. I will pray.

  14. justMe says:

    Supertradmum,

    Satanism is a umbrella term to describe a varied group of beliefs, there are distinct varieties: Atheistic Satanists and Theistic Satanists.
    The Atheistic type worship themselves, they don’t believe in any type of deity and pursue a hedonistic lifestyle. Theistic Satanists are split at least two ways, the ones you’ve described and the much larger group who believe Lucifer is the supreme being and not fallen at all, only misunderstood and misrepresented.
    Even the ones most likely responsible for this crime believe the battle is winnable; they mock the power in the Sacrament thereby weakening it (so they think) to build up their master’s power. They don’t believe in our version of the events leading to the fall, they see GOD as unfair and a legitimate target of ridicule and hatred.
    So no matter which group referred to deluded is an appropriate term for them.

  15. jmhj5 says:

    I believe there is to be two (2) adorers to “Our Lord”-if He is in exposition. In Nashville, TN people could walk off with the Tabernacle because it is not secure. Fought this battle to long-communities do not care. What is at the top flows down. It falls on the bishop.

  16. albizzi says:

    Every month there is an overnight adoration in our parish. Of course a schedule is arranged with the attendants so that never the church would be void even for one second and the monstrance left without anybody watching over.
    But imagine: Sometimes by 2:00 or 3:00 AM there are only 2 women in adoration. It would be very easy for only one man to grab the monstrance and flee with it.
    I believe this would be a good thing for the monstrance at least to be discreetly chained to the altar, and possibly adapt a locking system to the glass round window too so that it cannot be opened too easily by someone unaware of it .
    Catholics have to adapt themselves to the the harsh times being.

  17. Mashenka says:

    albizzi, in France when I was there back in the ’70s, they had small groups of elderly people who were known as “les silencieuses de l’église” [the silent ones of the church–mostly elderly widows] who had a rota of times when they would go and sit in cathedrals quietly. I thought that was a lovely thing for them to do, and at the time, it did provide pretty good protection for the cathedrals..

    Nowadays, I’d be one of those if I could, and I’d take my mobile phone with me, with the ringer set on “vibrate” (so as not to disturb) and the police number on speed-dial; but things have got pretty bad in the cities, so maybe it shouldn’t be just one lone old soul there, even with a mobile to dial the police if danger arose. Our church was burglarised and some very skinny young person broke the bottom pane of a stained-glass window and stole a lot of things that were un-pawnable (as I’m sure the youth found out when he tried!). The items, which were only gold-plated, however, did not reappear; the pastor said sadly, “Please pray for poor little ‘Skinny’….” He had to be skinny or he couldn’t ever have squeezed in through that broken window. It made us sad every time we went to church, because the kid broke a part of the window that depicted Our Lady’s feet…. so now Our Lady has no feet…..

    I pray for little ‘Skinny’,. but I also pray for those who live close enough to the church to get there on foot and sit there a while. To me, their feet will be “Our Lady’s Feet”….

  18. AnAmericanMother says:

    Our pastor has an arrangement with all the Catholic officers on all the local police forces, and one of them is always on duty. That’s a whole lot better than nothing, but one or two officers can’t be everywhere at once. The speed dial is a good idea though.

    It’s not legal here to concealed carry in church, but I wouldn’t stake much money on persons at 2 a.m. being unprepared. This is the South, after all.

  19. apagano says:

    I believe that our parish has an alarm system around the tabernacle. I think it is set up to go off if someone either tries to open the Tabernacle or touch it. I’m not sure if you get to close it goes off, I haven’t tried. It would be good if all parishes were able to do this somehow.

  20. irishgirl says:

    Terrible to read this!
    Our Adoration Chapel is in the rectory of the parish. The only way anyone can get in is by using a code on the back door, which only registered adorers know.
    Reading Mashenka’s post made me remember what happened some years ago in Domremy-la-Pucelle, the birthplace of St. Joan of Arc. There was a break-in at the Church of St-Remy, which is next to the house where St. Joan was born. Quite a few sacred vessels were stolen-I think there was even a monstrance taken. I don’t know if anything was recovered; but the end result was that the church had a security system installed. I sent a donation to cover the cost of it, and I received in return a nice certificate from the parish priest and the mayor of the village as their way of saying ‘merci’.

  21. Dr. Eric says:

    When I lived in Missouri, someone stole some golden candlesticks from the local shrine, but nothing as heinous as this happened.

  22. mike cliffson says:

    You can google news to the most explicit local report, to 13ths ABC, and also the local newspaper: Although the pastor is in favour of the church being open, in this case there WERE people in the church, one lot in some group praying or whatever, presumably in a side chapel, others shifting the last bits of the crib(at a guess,from the date , just the tables left over from underneath: as well as a basic crib on the altar Spaniards LOVE tenniscourt-sized cribs with everything separately represented from the annunciation to the flight into eygpt,with pyramids , interspersed with castles of soldiers, so as you know where the foreground innocentsslaughterers are quartered, herod’s palce,stray peasants, etc etc). The two robbers apparantly came with iron Jemmies ? Rods? under their clothes, hung around a moment or so, then with witnesses to their general appearance nonetheless in seconds concertedly jemmied the tabernacle off the retablo to which it was firmly attached and made off.
    Majadahonda is just about the closest northern small town surrounded by countryside to Madridcity (3.5 million, Madrid region 6to 7 million), closer to the centre than many parts of builtup mardid itself, with a core of old villagers, mostly upmarket,lots of TV and media people and politicians live there, and greatly expanded in general, with four if not five motorways to hand , frequent trains, in the centre neither vehicles nor people opf any sort stand out, so it’s a good and easy place to “make waves”. 2nd thing this church + another church this municipalty MAY just be unrelated.MSM in spanish too only descibe followers of certain religions as “men” but this case looks more Satanic/political.

  23. Mashenka says:

    Dear irishgirl, AnAmericanMother and Dr. Eric,

    Yes, I think I’d agree with apagano, if my parish could afford it, that an alarm system is a great idea. But if we couls afford the alarm system, we’d also need, for Father, a remote control with a code for the alarm system, so he can remember to turn the alarm off before he touches anything on the altar….especially if the alarm system has a motion-detector in it. An alarm system would be great, though, once Benediction is over and Adoration is taking place (while ideally, no one should be approaching the altar until Adoration is about to conclude). At that point, the priest can turn the alarm off with his remote control before he goes back to the altar, then replace the Sacrament in the tabernacle, and put the monstrance away, then relock everything and turn the alarm back on. This wordy warning comes from experience, from one who has an alarm on the house, but when in a hurry, forgets to disarm the alarm before leaving a door open….

    With prayers for all whose churches have been robbed or otherwise vilely treated by (I hope) ignorant people who have no idea what a sacrilege they are committing, and prayers for the people who, knowingly or unknowingly, do such dreadful things..

  24. mike cliffson says:

    NB
    “Sagrario”= sanctuary, tabernacle, monstrance….
    They stole Our lord’s body,inside.Profanation.Barefaced in everysense.

  25. Jayna says:

    Or stupid teenagers with nothing better to do with their time. There are plenty of those.

  26. AnAmericanMother says:

    Jayna,

    Not stupid teenagers. They break in when nobody’s around and vandalize stuff.

    From the more detailed story posted above (thanks Mike), this was a “hot” burglary – a brazen crime – carried out with people present – carried out with organized speed – this was planned by experienced criminals. The folks in the church were wise not to interfere, they would have probably gotten a cracked skull or two for their trouble. Oh, for two or three big beefy Irish cops with nightsticks to administer the old-fashioned “wood shampoo”!

    The only questions remaining are who they were and why they committed this crime.

    I will, reluctantly, pray for their souls — but more enthusiastically pray for their apprehension and conviction and the recovery of the Blessed Sacrament.

  27. Emilio III says:

    Although the situation of the Church in Spain is pretty bad, there are some encouraging signs. Recently the Archbishop of Valencia dedicated a new [ugly modern] parish to the 274 martyrs of Valencia “from St Vincent to our days, and surely there will be more soon”. http://bit.ly/9xDiT9 “In these difficult times there is a temptation in our culture and our society to want to hide God.” “It is precisely in these times that we should remember our predecessors who gave their lives for Jesus Christ and ask their intercession to help us live as they did.” Valencia seems to be in good hands. OTOH, Seville…

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