Deep pockets undermine Catholic teaching through bribes

What a cheery day.

I direct the attention of the readership to this piece from the aptly-named Crisis:

Marginalizing Catholic Teaching One Grant at a Time

George Soros’ Open Society Institute is most often blamed for attempting to neutralize the abortion issue for Catholics by donating large amounts of money to progressive organizations like Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good to promote pro-choice politicians. Yet the recent attack on San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Codileone by Faithful America demonstrates that the real assault on the teaching authority of the Catholic Church is now coming from two gay billionaires—Tim Gill and Jon Stryker—who are doing everything they can to discredit Church teaching on sexual morality by directly attacking the Magisterium.

Unlike Soros, whose attack on the teachings of the Church was indirect and somewhat secretive, Stryker’s Arcus Foundation and the Gill Foundation have made their aims explicit in their grant making materials and on their IRS 990 reporting forms. In their 2012 filing to the IRS, the Arcus Foundation described itself as a private grantmaking foundation that supports nonprofit organizations around the world working in two areas: lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender human rights; and conservation of the world’s great apes.

In the former area, Arcus provides money to those organizations—including Catholic colleges as well as progressive faith-based organizations—who are working toward “full inclusion” of gays and lesbians, including access to same sex marriage. For example, hundreds of thousands of dollars has been awarded to Women’s Alliance for Theology Ethics for seeking to achieve social justice through the Arcus LGBT Rights Program. The goal of the $70,000 grant to Women’s Alliance for Theology Ethics in 2010 was identified by Arcus as intending to “create a cadre of Catholic, lesbian, bisexual and transgender women and their allies that would assume a leadership role within the Catholic community.” Escalating their attack in 2011, in their IRS 990 form, filed on December 31, 2012, Arcus disclosed that the $180,000 awarded to the Women’s Alliance for Theology and Ethics that year was to be used to: “Identify, network, train and amplify the voices of lesbian feminist Catholics and in so doing, create a counter-voice to the Catholic hierarchy that respects, values and affirms people of all sexual orientations and gender identities.”

Arcus Buys a “Counter Voice” to the Catholic Hierarchy
The Arcus strategy is to help progressive Catholic organizations to convince Catholics of the goodness and morality of gay and lesbian behavior by providing large sums of money to them. For example, Fairfield University was a perfect choice for funding from Arcus since it houses theology professors like Paul Lakeland, an embittered ex-priest, and current head of Fairfield’s Catholic Studies Department. Lakeland, whose books Liberation of the Laity, and Catholicism at the Crossroads, demand dramatic changes in the Church—including the abolition of the College of Cardinals, and changes in Church teachings on reproductive rights, women’s ordination, and the inclusion of gay and married priests—received a $100,000 grant from the Arcus Foundation in 2010 “to hold and disseminate information from a series of forums at four academic institutions in order to expand the current discussion on homosexuality within Roman Catholicism to include the diverse opinions of progressive Catholic thought leaders and theologians.”

[…]

Read the rest there.

The Olympian Middle will surely say that this is all an exaggeration.

St. Michael the Archangel…

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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40 Comments

  1. acricketchirps says:

    Time for bishops to get off their butts and start insisting that their parish priests begin withholding communion from great apes.

  2. AngelGuarded says:

    The father of lies never sleeps. Living faithfully is a battle. And that is not a metaphor. St Michael defend us!

  3. Mike Morrow says:

    “…Arcus Foundation…supports nonprofit organizations…working in two areas: lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender human rights; and conservation of the world’s great apes.”

    Very logical…one would expect there to be some overlap of those two areas.

  4. DisturbedMary says:

    I wonder how much they drop in the collection at the Pride Masses? Maybe that explains why at least three pride-friendly Churches in Manhattan seem to be getting the “Bravo” and God Bless You treatment from our hierarchy.

  5. Priam1184 says:

    The hierarchy must know all of this (how could they not?) and has never done anything to stop this. It is time that we who live in the United States and are in communion with the See of St. Peter start stating the obvious publicly and not stop until it is resolved: the individuals who compose the present hierarchy of the Catholic Church, its bishops and high level clerics and lay people, have made a deliberate choice for this world and its prince. There is no other way to explain what has gone on in the Church for my entire lifetime.

    A strong case can be made the the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, in its current composition, is in fact the most anti-Catholic organization in the United States, far surpassing the Obama Administration in its desire for the destruction of the Catholic Faith. Look around. It is night.

  6. Chris Garton-Zavesky says:

    Perhaps the Olympian middle will look at the question differently when the documents currently resident with the IRS are released (photostatically?) so that the evidence isn’t hearsay. If I understand Crisis correctly, the purpose amounts to “we’re going to try to create confusion and bribe others to create confusion, so the Church magisterium blinks.” Even people who believe in the rightness of the positions supported by this group won’t like the methods, surely?

  7. JARay says:

    This is very disturbing and I do believe that it is true. Satan is truly at work and he has infiltrated the Church only too well in many sections. The words of the late Pope Paul VI are so chilling…”The smoke of Satan has entered the Church”. But we must not despair. Jesus is with the Church until the end of time.

  8. anilwang says:

    This isn’t an old problem.

    The Church has had two millenia of outsiders (i.e. Protestants, Gnostics, Schismatics, Heretics, Persecutors, Muslims, etc) telling the world that they are the true church of the apostles and that Catholics believe all sorts of crazy things. They regularly tried to tell Catholics that the Catholic Church teaches all sorts of things that it doesn’t and it is a false Church.

    In past days, the average Catholic just brushed them off. They trusted their priests and their priests all told the same story under the governance of their bishop. Each bishop also told the same story. And given that the laity were actually taught the basics of the faith and always had some other lay person nearby who knew more about the faith than they did, the laity tended to have the same story.

    So it was nearly impossible for someone to misrepresent the Catholic Church since from the Pope down to the laity, there was one essential story, and the occational heretic priest or bishop stood out like a sore thumb.

    That consistency has been shattered since at least the Vatican Council/Humane Vitae Revolt/Catholic University Revolt.

    So now, it’s easy to misrepresent the Church even to Catholics and with public Catholic support. Worse yet, most of the laity (even faithful daily mass attending laity) now doubt that the Church knows as much as it says it does and doubt at least some doctrines.

    The sad thing is that most Bishops and priests don’t care about the chaos, and many think it’s good since it gives free expression to the laity. They don’t realize that guard rails might restrict your freedom, but that falling off a cliff due to a lack of such guard rails and dying restricts your freedom even more and that the guard rails allow you to fearlessly play closer to the ledge than you would have if they weren’t there.

  9. Elizabeth D says:

    Don’t forget the millions in Hilton Foundation grants to National Catholic Reporter for news coverage of sisters from their radical progressive perspective and also a large grant to a progressive sisters vocation promoting website that also advertises the ex-Catholic, non-Catholic Holy Wisdom Monastery, and for a progressive initiative called “National Catholic Sisters Week”. The purpose of the grants was obviously to promote progressive dissident type sisters.

    “Women’s Alliance for Theology Ethics” should read “Women’s Alliance for Theology Ethics and Ritual”, its acronym is WATER. This is lesbian Mary Hunt’s group. They have radical feminist Catholic members and protestants also, they are into feminist “alternative liturgies” and obviously lesbian “theology.” They are a “womenchurch”/”women’s ordination” group.

    Fr. Z's Gold Star Award

  10. Bob B. says:

    This is one of the more insidious problems for the Church, is large part because the bishops have failed to act and be clear in teaching the Magisterium.
    How many Gay Pride marches include people from Catholic churches in SF, LA, NYC, Chicago, etc? How many pastors have allowed LGBT groups to meet in their parishes?
    How many politicians are allowed to pass as Catholics because they say they are, though they vote for abortion, SSM, etc?
    How many Catholic school students are taught by CINOs and non-Catholics who praise the virtues of Modernism while ridding their schools of faithful Catholics? (The most dangerous are those who were “taught” in one of the Jesuit universities – they know the “language” but don’t believe it.)
    How many bishops have used Canon 915?

  11. benedetta says:

    Huge amounts of money (billions…) can accomplish some things, and, good and innocent people, children even, are harmed by these efforts, sometimes criminally harmed physically and in their persons, homes and effects, and, what any given operative does or induces others to do on the ground by means of paying people to do criminal things is currently being tried. People may be lied to, intimidated, duped, used for the interests of a moneyed and powerful relative few. It’s certain that this is happening, and has been happening, for a long time. At least when it comes to political organizing such as Acorn or some of the things we have seen in terms of on the ground harassment, or campaign finance, there is a modicum (I’ll admit it’s not so much) of sunshine laws which rightly dictate that the average citizen is entitled to know how money is being used to pressure or induce or intimidate people in order to gain political results. Here, no one is going to put in the church bulletin that this group or persons, being paid by Soros or whomever, will be giving a presentation today at 3 pm in the parish hall, all are welcome. Yet person’s dignity and free will, human rights and freedom of religion dictates, according to even UN standards, that such financial remuneration be disclosed so that people may make an educated and rational decision with factual information. Strong pastors are aware of such currents. Some make their flock vulnerable to this, sadly.

    There are quite a number of events in the past year that one could point to and with a little digging could uncover quite a horrific trail of flat out obsessed hatred towards innocent people of faith.

    Is anyone else wondering what the back story, the motive/context behind the AP Catholic bashing hoax of this month? Surely a professional journalist doesn’t just run with out and out fraud unless someone makes it worth their while. The key here in any thing that seems not right and so far from even criminal rackets as to be beyond the pale is to ask who is benefiting or how.

    Yet, ultimately no human rights denying outfit can ever finally control the Holy Spirit.

  12. Magash says:

    I worry about this, but I don’t overly worry about. Look we either believe that the Church is protected from error by the Holy Spirit or we don’t.
    That doesn’t guarantee that the Church in the United States will preserve in truth, but it does guarantee that ultimately the Prince of Lies will not win. I gave up true hope for my country when a Supreme Court declared infanticide was legal. Every year that passes tells me that it is not long for this world in any form that would be recognizable to the founders.
    So now it comes to how long the Magisterium will allow things in the U.S. to continue as it is before taking action against those bishops, schools and universities which have left the communion of the Church by their actions. Where are St. Nicolas, St Dominic and St. Francis when you need them? I’ve no doubt their successors will show up when we most need them.

  13. Vecchio di Londra says:

    This is appalling. One might ask, what on earth is the point of having national conferences of bishops if they do not unitedly, swiftly and toughly address national issues of this kind?

    I can visualise this kind of malignant propaganda undermining the whole of the western world with far too-little-too-late resistance from the hierarchy.

    How did we ever get to this point?

  14. LeslieL says:

    Alrighty then……just to start – Oh, my goodness, Mike Morrow! You get my award for Fr. Z “Spit-take of the Day” Still choking…
    Now – to the article. I read this yesterday, and I am still reeling from it. There is a tremendous amount of money backing this agenda. I keep getting the feeling that “they” saw the calendar change to 2014 and decided to go “all in” with a make or break attitude this time out. I do think that part of the problem is that Catholics always have this “turn the other cheek” thing going on and that we have become the “Church of Nice.” No one must be offended or insulted. Taken in and of itself, not a bad thing – but these well funded attacks are scary when we do nothing about them. When the media is against you, it is also very difficult to get your defense, position, belief out there. We – the general populace – must depend on our Priests and Bishops….please keep proclaiming the truth. We need to hear it. And we will help you all we can…..

  15. Uxixu says:

    As long as heretics and apostates are allowed to keep their Catholic title unchallenged, this will continue to fester. Excommunications and public repudiation are absolutely necessary. That will probably lead to some high profile, if not mass counterreactions by those in the grip of secularist-homosexual-tinged popular culture, but too many are unwittingly thinking they can toe that line of orthodoxy when they’re already over it and defying the Magisterium of Holy Mother Church.

  16. benedetta says:

    One aspect of it is that in many areas priests have already been so silenced for decades in terms of preaching that anything that could remotely smack of “politics” has been omitted in homilies or programming etc. So, in some places at least it will be easy to spot where a situation is brewing just from the anomaly of it. This tactic has proven successful, in certain places, otherwise why would a passionate investment savvy aparatchik invest so much into it. If it hasn’t a track record, other means would be tried. It is a typical American maneuver, time-honored, to throw money at an issue and to buy one’s way and to force people via money at all costs to worship something someone entitled desires. This is a good time to meditate on the letters of St. Paul.

  17. rcg says:

    This is serious, and I do not want to take away from that, but considering the Arcus Mission Statement the thought came to me that they are interesting in supporting organizations that ape true cultural programmes.

  18. chantgirl says:

    How many poor people could have been fed, clothed, housed, or educated with the money that has been wasted on these dissident groups. Homosexual Astroturf movements!

    The homosexual and abortion lobbies are at their core a raging rejection of God and natural law. This Trojan horse attempt to change the Church’s teaching will eventually evolve into outright persecution when the Church fails to bend to their demands, although I’m sure some clergy and laity will cave to the pressure.

  19. Moro says:

    Doesn’t shock me at all. And it explains so much. I wouldn’t be surprised if they fund other things like hospitals, schools, and other charities with the unspoken assumption that the powers at be take it easy on gay issues. This is why we need Catholic lay people to stop being professional liturgists, chancery officials, “pastoral associates”, etc. Unfortunately too many Catholic young people grow up in an environment that suggests if you are serious about your faith and you don’t have a priestly or religious vocation, you should go work for a diocese, a Catholic college, a parish, or some pro-life group. You can excommunicate people all you want. That’s all well and good but we need faithful orthodox Catholics who work at big banks, major corporations, in government, secular academia, etc. because when Catholics are in leadership roles in secular society they can tilt the balance in their favor and if they get rich like Tim Gill, then they can use those funds to advance a Culture of Life and the Catholic Faith. There is nothing more effective to getting your way than threatening to cut the flow of money.

  20. ChesterFrank says:

    Sometimes the most damaging attacks on Catholicism and Catholics comes from other Catholics. Its easy to recognize attacks from the outside, but the ones from the inside always seem to be brushed off as simple differences of opinion; even though those insiders are often the most motivated to bring about a change or accept a bribe.

  21. Lay Brethren,

    We have to put more of our own money and effort where our faith is. One by one we can reach people…. Tip O’Neill [*facepalm* Am I really invoking Tip on Fr. Z’s Blog???] said all politics is local. Well…. so is the parish, the community, the diocese. I’m spending my Summer getting out of my bunker and back into the public square. Don’t let Goliath discourage you. Come on out and bring your SPF, cuz it’s a little hot out here!

  22. Kathleen10 says:

    This is a very serious matter, and the effectiveness of these efforts are obvious to most of us now. At least we are mostly all awake and aware. Two years ago not many were even realizing how far this had gone. It is insidious. Good on ya Fr. Z. for mentioning this. This is the kind of information we would have benefited from in the last 30 years if someone had given it to us.
    For myself I have stopped waiting on the Bishops. There are the notable exceptions and God bless them. We have God to lean on and we will need him. He has promised not to leave us and that the gates of hell shall not prevail. There are so many Catholicism haters or those who are utterly indifferent about any of it, or who hope homosexuality wins the day. I doubt they realize the Church is under such great attacks, or maybe they do and they are happy. In a world where Islam is such a threat it is always a bit incredible to hear Catholicism haters. Talk about misplaced priorities.

  23. The Masked Chicken says:

    As has been suspected for some time, now, America seems longer to be categorized, properly, as a democracy or a republic, but, rather, as a rule by the wealthy elite, which is close to a type of oligarchy. A recent study by political scientists at Princeton and Northwestern Universities, who had access to unique datasets, seems to show this. Their 42 page paper is online for anyone to read:

    https://www.princeton.edu/~mgilens/Gilens%20homepage%20materials/Gilens%20and%20Page/Gilens%20and%20Page%202014-Testing%20Theories%203-7-14.pdf

    They point out that the common man has almost no influence in the dictation of policies and their influence is decreasing as time goes on. Given that the battle for the culture is largely being fought by corporations and those who spend exorbitant amounts of money and given that, by-and-large, the super-rich have more or less either liberal views or at least some views that disagree with Church teachings, is it really surprising that there are shadow puppets trying to remove the influence of the Church’s true teachings from public life, where those views conflict with their personal agendas?

    Of course, there are several things that can be done. The Super-PAC idea, fight-fire-with-fire, is one way to go – pit billionaires against each other, but, in the end, the real problem seems to be a lack of focus among the common man that allows any and all voices, no matter how weird, to be heard.

    Why is no one spending billions of dollars on Cold Fusion research? The answer is that it has been discredited. Oh, if one threw money at it, the people could put on quite a show for a while, but in the end, it is a failed idea.

    The same applies to the homosexual agenda. It is a failed idea, but unlike the Cold Fusion debacle, where the idea was discredited by the application of a systematic method of inquiry (scientific reproducibility), the systematic methods that would quickly discredit the homosexual agenda, while they exist, are not within the collective will of the masses to implement. Just as discrediting Cold Fusion is a physics problem, discrediting the homosexual agenda is a metaphysical problem and it is exactly the techniques of metaphysics which are being blocked by the agenda of the wealthy. Time and time again, whenever a social change has been suggested, unlike in past ages where a moral or metaphysical test would have been run and debated, big money has largely blocked these correct avenues of truth-testing in favor of visceral appeals to emotions.

    Until the common man begins to sense, again, that there is something Eternal beyond its immediate needs, it will ignore the calls for testing all things and retaining what is good in favor of the quick fix, the easy score. Have you ever noticed that homosexual activists almost never spend any time defending traditional marriage, even though they are trying to argue that their relationship is every bit as good? No, they can’t do that. It would, quickly, take them into the realms of Natural Law theory and the metaphysics of marriage and their arguments would quickly be discredited. Instead, they funnel money into the base, the superficial, the instantaneous gratification of lower nature without daring to admit that man also has a higher nature.

    The Catholic Bishops could quickly throw a monkey wrench into this mess by simply penalizing, either by excommunication (if possible) or some sort of just punishment, anyone who spends money, either directly or indirectly, with full knowledge and forethought in any endeavor which harms the Catholic Church. They may not be able to stop Stryker and Gill from trying to give money to further the homosexual agenda, but they sure as heck can stop Catholics who want retain the name and any a relationship with the Church from making use of any of it.

    I would love to see that happen, but, then again, I would also like to see flying cars. To be realistic, I think the latter is more likely than the former, in almost any part of the world.

    When Jesus said that you cannot serve God and Mammon, the Greek quickly got translated, too simplistically, in my opinion, as Mammon being the love of money. That is not really the Greek concept. It is, more closely, doing things your own way. Money is a great facilitator of this, however. It should, more correctly be translated, “You cannot serve God’s interests and your own.” In other words, there can only be one God in your life. Really, the super-rich who use money for their own ends, are trying to substitute their God for the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob. Viewed in that way, people should shudder in horror, except for the fact that they really haven’t got a clear idea of Who God is, anymore. Perhaps that should be a topic for a Bishop’s retreat. Do they even have those?

    Oh, and this article should really give more kudos to Thomas Peters (how is he doing, Dr. Peters?), who did the journeyman’s work of ferreting out the details.

    The Chicken

  24. The Masked Chicken says:

    Arghh…

    First sentence should read:

    “As has been suspected for some time, now, America seems no longer to be categorized, properly, as a democracy or a republic, but, rather, as a rule by the wealthy elite, which is close to a type of oligarchy.”

    I did proof-read. Honest.

    The Chicken

  25. MarkG says:

    Unfortunately, “deep pockets” will play out on both sides of every issue (not just this issue), with often the winner being whoever gets the most billionaires or corporations to back their causes.
    This is due to the Citizens United decision of the SCOTUS.
    Many Evangelical Christians held public prayer rallies for the Citizens United decision. I think they were assuming conservatives would be the only ones with deep pockets. Their prayers were answered.

    I think it would be better to overturn Citizens United and go back to a system where people and advocacy groups are limited to small amounts. In the age of the Internet, grass roots efforts are easier than ever and more accurately reflect individuals.

  26. JustaSinner says:

    Would only take ONE FMJ to get both of those peter puffers as you would just wait until they are pretending to be the beast with two backs

  27. KevinSymonds says:

    A dialogue with St. Bernadette that was published in 1872:

    – Did you receive, in the grotto of Lourdes, or after then, any revelations related to the future and fate of France? Did not the Blessed Virgin deliver any warning for France, any threats?

    – No

    – The Prussians are at our gates; does that not cause you any fear?

    – No.

    – There is thus nothing to fear?

    – I only fear bad Catholics.

    – You do not fear anything else?

    – No, nothing else.

  28. robtbrown says:

    The US has always been an oligarchy. it works because it’s a flexible oligarchy. The families of oligarchs change from generation to generation

  29. Dimitri_Cavalli says:

    Many activist groups on the left and right like to portray themselves as grassroots organizations that rely solely on small, individual donations. In fact, most of these groups rely heavily on donations from the many private foundations that exist. It’s not just the Koch Brothers, George Soros, and Richard Mellon Scaife (he funded a lot of anti-Clinton investigations in the 1990s, but was eventually redeemed in the eyes of the left when it was revealed that he also funds Planned Parenthood.)

    What’s wrong with this picture? Left-wing religious groups such as Faithful America hold capitalism in contempt, yet it’s the capitalist system that produced the billionaires who are supporting them and their current financial lifestyle.

    Can anyone imagine John Gehring’s Faithful America or Sr. Simone Campbell’s Network Lobby surrendering their group’s tax-exempt status in order to help the government fund the social programs that they insist that Catholic social teaching demands?

  30. Johnno says:

    Worth repeating:

    Fr. Manuel Rocha:
    “In your opinion, will every country, without exception, be overcome by communism?”

    Sister Lucia:
    “Yes.”

    Fr. Manuel Rocha:
    “And does that mean the United States of America too?”

    Sister Lucia:
    “Yes.”

    Heaven already gave us the solution of what the Pope and Bishops should do. And it sure wasn’t Vatican II…

    Don’t be fooled. Communism was ALWAYS funded by immensely rich people in the background, including interests in America. The point is, and has always been your slavery through your dependency on that mini-cartel of immensely wealthy interests that have always been involved in the course of remaking the world and mankind in their image, after their father, Satan, whose light illumines their minds rather than the light of God. They are determined to take the people of God back to Egypt so we may eat of their bread.

  31. Mike says:

    What’s going to be especially sickening will be the rationales that “Catholic” institutions give for accepting money from foundations that promote heresy — which is to say, in millennial terms, “inclusiveness” toward all attitudes save the faithful and orthodox.

    Not that we have much cause to be surprised, given the political and social adventuring that we’ve seen for half a century and more in dioceses, educational institutions, and religious orders once renowned for their well-nigh heroic fidelity to the Church. And quite a few of those formed many years ago in such disordered environments now have a lot of money to throw around. Whatever the outcome of the purported “biological solution,” dollars don’t have an expiration date. (Unless, as is quite possible, they are inflated out of existence. That and the consequential wholesale confiscation by the State of portable and real property may end up being the “solution,” which is going to feel an awful lot like “chastisement.”)

  32. Fr. Vincent Fitzpatrick says:

    The most destructive anti-Catholic organization, devoted to sabotaging the pro-life movement?

    There is an anti-Catholic organization that:

    Wasted years supporting the Human Life Amendment (rather than instructing the governors that nullification of Roe is MANDATED by Catholic teaching); rationalized voting for pro-aborts with the “Seamless Garment”; killed the Rescue Movement by REFUSING to instruct police that removing obstacles to a crime makes one an accomplice to that crime; supported socialized medicine–under the supervision of the most pro-abortion public officials in history; endorses the MORTAL SIN of giving Communion to pro-aborts as a “legitimate” option for bishops.

  33. benedetta says:

    People need to keep in mind what this looks like on the ground. The notion that this is somehow legitimate, grassroots, political action, albeit backed by billions, along the lines of Obama/Alinsky/the weathermen or any semi public face of organizing is erroneous. The idea that the money may be accounted for with legitimate action is simply an error. There will be semi public faces in the form of pastors, religious, and lay, non Catholic parish “employees” or hangers on at parish level, which, has been going on, agitating, for decades, inserting and dividing Catholic against Catholic, sometimes with pastor knowledge and blessing. The semi public face will have the usual buzz words we have come to know and love, everything is done as omission in the name of “pastoral” efforts and sensitivity or compassion. All is justified on that level, which will neglect families, children, reverent liturgy, progress in the spiritual life, holiness the bread and butter of the sacramental life in the Catholic spiritual life. Behind the scenes, not publicly, the money will go towards supporting acts of intimidation, harassment, criminal acts, to target Catholics who are, not cowed, or who didn’t get that they are supposed to be cowed or shut up and go along, Catholics who have family or outward hints of affiliation with the wrong political parties, Catholics with positions of responsibility or leadership in other spheres of life, Catholics who are perceived as people whose suffering via harassment one can make an example of to terrorize other would be truth tellers. From experience, friends.

    We need to unite within the beautiful and joyful diversity of orthodoxy. We need to support one another and our priests. We need to pray for our Bishops. We need to stay very close to the sacraments. We need to cultivate means of communication with one another that does not rely upon internet or cell phone. We need to attend to the youth who will be vulnerable and targeted. This is intent and tactic designed to destroy whatever may be left of the American church.

  34. Cathy says:

    When thinking about Pope Francis’ statement regarding a poor Church for the poor, this is exactly the type of activity that comes to mind – not the Church being anti-capitalist, but the Church being against the outside influence that flows with offers of money. This is as old as Judas accepting thirty pieces of silver.
    One simple question, was the Land O’Lakes statement really about academic freedom, or was it more about opening Catholic Universities to monies and anti-Catholic agendas?

  35. Fr. Vincent Fitzpatrick says:

    The same organization I mentioned above:

    Is campaigning relentlessly to build up an insuperable pro-abortion majority in the U.S. Immigrants (across all categories) vote 70% for pro-abortion politicians. O’Malley, Gomez, Wenski, etc., all know this, but they continue to support open borders, amnesty, citizenship, etc.

  36. cl00bie says:

    A gay lobby PAC (American Unity) bought our Congressman in NY-22, Richard Hanna. He’s pro-gay marriage and pro-late term abortion.

    I spent the campaign helping Claudia Tenney, but this PAC dumped a half a million dollars on misleading ads, claiming that Tenney was liberal, and voted to raise taxes (she never did, she voted on comprehensive budget bills). She lost the primary by 4 points. It was heartbreaking.

  37. benedetta says:

    The economy is horrible right now, and there are a lot of people in the secular world, as well as in parish world, who would do certain things to get a little extra money. Some will do out of animus or hatred. Some will be duped into believing themselves doing something righteous or helpful.

    Here is how it plays out as a set up within parish/religious/academic circles. The paid operative ingratiates or is employed at parish level. On the side, they accept inducement to do any number of simple even possibly benign or helpful seeming things. Some will be paid operatives who are not so helpful or benign. Regardless, once ingratiated, they turn to parishioners (some places because of large size or already liberal leaning political activism are of course the starting point) and say, usually uninvited or unsought, x spectacular/terrific slander about a target (who might be, pastor, asst pastor, lay person…whomever is on their hit list). The slander will have just enough verifiable identifying detail so that if someone looked on the internet they would believe the horrific lie possibly credible. Usually the lie will be loaded to generate emotional anger. Often the dupe has already been checked out for what particular perceived injustice gets them going. It won’t necessarily be gay politically related per se. It could be just about anything. Including “conservative” seeming “causes”. To a Catholic, someone, even as a “friend” or especially “acquaintance” approaching with undesired or asked for “information” (ie detraction, gossip) would be the first red flag. A Catholic in a decent parish with a decent pastor doing pastoral things for his flock might in turn relate without accusation or anger the fact that something of this sort occurred. At any rate most usually do not follow up in that way, and why would they. Then they will be asked to participate in some political organizing at the parish level, and thus be joined to an “anti” Catholic faction or block.

    Truly, all that America magazine and others have written in detraction of Opus Dei and the like pales by comparison to this octopus and beast.

    It is happening in the secular world in much more revved up terms, but then we know that persons without benefit of sacraments are quite vulnerable to a great many things.

    Outside of the watchful eye of parish, others with opportunity, time on their hands, and hatred to go around are induced to follow up on other hate-based and criminal (stalking etc) actions towards the target. Some will be designed to “make it look like” it is coming from, church, school, hobby club, family, friends, work etc. Of course the follow up leads to money to burn.

    It does fit criminal RICO framework, of course.

    A decent liberal journalist may rightly inquire: when is it acceptable, in ethical or humanist terms, for someone with billions of dollars, who is not a professing member of such and such religion, to pay others to do numerous things towards that religion’s adherents? Though the ends may be different, this is in reality no different from what we see happening in the middle east. Huge amounts of money siphoned to operatives on the ground in one particular location to persecute violently religious adherents of a different faith.

    Politically one may rightly ask why the association between, gay rights, on the one hand, which asks for equal protection under laws and civil rights, and, advocacy for crueler and greater abortion, and, harassment of Catholics, many of whom pose no actual threat to the gay political agenda in any real terms at all, whether politically, financially, whatever.

    At the end of the day what is occurring is not mere politics. It is not “liberal” politics or any other sort of bona fide politics. All the “liberal” Catholic politicians who are now energizing hatred against fellow Christians you can be certain were bought off or cowed a long time ago and the reason for bashing Christians is out of fear. It has some historical analogs and yet it is completely of our times.

    This is the face of totalitarianism. This is about destroying the Church under the guise of politics.

    Just as the Chicken has said here, when one looks back to previous eras of infiltration/organizing against the Church, and then when you look at the fruits of the surface “politics” one can see that it is not humanist, it is not humanitarian, it is not statesmanship, civics, patriotism, or “politics”. It is something else altogether.

    The solution in our times is what the Second Vatican Council rightly called all Christians two: personal holiness.

  38. KevinSymonds says:

    @Johnno:

    I think you missed some important information about that interview with Sr. Lucia. When you read William Walsh’s book on Our Lady of Fatima, Sr. Lucia did not say America “will” become Communist. She was speaking in the context of the consecration of Russia not happening which will then, in turn, make the US Communist.

  39. benedetta says:

    It seems that it goes without saying, at least for those of us who grew up at a time when decent liberals were still to be found in large numbers. But of course there are numerous gay folks and also people who though deceived into believing in prochoice who would never in a million years resort to or condone any such tactics as these. As far as there being many politicians who can resist, I am not as confident. There are people of good will on all places on the political spectrum who would never support or encourage or willingly participate in such actions, people of reason, and principle, integrity, true humanists. One aspect of this is that decent people are willing to be duped into doing things, and some otherwise decent people just need the money and have lacked for much of an ethical formation given our entirely secular celebrating culture which for at least a couple of generations has removed all voices of conscience and morality from schools, public square, media. They are simply unable to recognize virtue, or goodness, much less cooperate with it.

    So I repeat, it’s not ultimately about gay activism, though it might assume certain forms. It’s not ultimately about politics.

    Another good question to ask is to look at our so-called “liberal” wing of our American Church. Most who have vocally campaigned for Obama’s agenda have stated, in enjoining fellow Catholics to vote a certain way, that, Obama would dialogue with prolife, that ultimately expanded safety net favored a radical decrease in abortion, that ultimately healthcare for all was about Catholic social justice. I know not many on this board bought all that. But a great many Catholics took all of that quite seriously. I know personally many good, orthodox Catholics who take very seriously the Church’s social justice teachings and who are not at all shills for the Republican party or for the Tea Party. At the same time, they do not lie about the genocide abortion in this country has become. So we have been placed in that position by, pastors, church folks, Catholic media, Catholic pundits, Catholic academia. One wonders, now that all the goodies have come down from the support thrown to that political party, why it seems totally impossible to get behind a humanitarian cause and say, half of black babies sacrificed to abortion in our New York City is a horror. Many of the same prolifers today stood arm in arm with MLK Jr, some Catholic, some of different Christian denominations, or of different faiths. Surely the considerable political capital that the bus nuns, certain Obama vote delivering orders, campuses, pastors, Bishops, parishes, have stored up to obtain all these measures, even winning on gay rights, all of this, could now be used to better the way we order our lives together, in a distinctly American and humanist way. So one can rightly ask, what are all these Catholics so very afraid of here. So this, at the end of the day, is not about politics. It is about fear, and, we will find much to gain about how we respond when we look at the societies enslaved by totalitarianism during the last century and continuing today.

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