Creepy, unsettling evil. Yes, a Jesuit was involved. UPDATED: Fr Z rants about idiotic false compassion.

UPDATE 30 August:

This is a very important update, which, in justice, people should follow up on and read.

Jesuit-run (of course) Amerika has an interview with the Jesuit who was the celebrant of “Bob’s” last Mass, where he seems to have engineered the blessing by children in front of the photographer. He disavows any previous knowledge. He says he didn’t really get what was going on. He states that he has no pastoral role at that parish, other than the occasional Mass. He has had a few tough days since this story broke.

You should go and read that interview as Jesuit-run Amerika and decided for yourselves. HERE

If what he says is true.  Then I feel for the guy.

That said, why choose that parish to go to for Sunday Mass… ever?  Why that parish, when I suspect he could chose others and be welcomed.

UPDATE 30 August:

Since I originally posted on this, pretty early out of the gate for this story, more information came out.  I had one update, inserted below, in which the Seattle Archdiocese stated that the Jesuit priest didn’t know what “Bob” was up to.   The problem is that the internet exists.  A lot of people knew, as it turns out.  He had consulted at the parish.  He had written, online, that the Jesuit approved. By process of elimination, that points to the Jesuit in question.

This whole thing oozes evil like sore on the back of a very sick hyena.

One Mad Mom has a pretty good summation of the situation (emphases mine):

Let me be clear. Trying to compare this to a run of the mill suicide is ridiculous. Bob Fuller’s thoughts were documented to the end. And to allow anyone to pre-schedule their own funeral is simply awful. Maybe, at that point, someone might have least looked into the rest of his problems.

This man was a public, obstinate sinner who showed no remorse, even after counselling from his pastor for his suicide. On his way out the door he chose to marry his homosexual partner hours before, he thought he was a shaman, boasted of his past affairs on Facebook, etc. and very little was done to stop and correct him. He was intent on doing it and his funeral was approved by the archbishop.  Bob at least knew, according to the archdiocese, the Church’s teaching on the dignity of life and still did it. What in THE heck were they all thinking? Scratch that! Was anyone thinking? How many more have been scandalized by this???  How many more think it’s just fine because the Church will simply roll over and give them their lovely funeral as if it means absolutely nothing but a nice goodbye? This is, simply, hideous. At THE very least, the pastor or archbishop should have manned up and been there to hear confession at the end if he was willing but they just signed off on it as “Well, there’s nothing else we can do because he’s determined to do it!” The Church has failed Bob Fuller and those that will follow his example. I hope those that threw up their hand hit the confessional this weekend. Prayers for you Bob. You were failed beyond belief.

One of the reasons why the Church had the seemingly – to modern, and therefore foggy and filmy eyes – harsh law about denying burial to obstinate public sinners and to suicides was for the sake of prevention of scandal.  Holy Church is the greatest expert on humanity that there has ever been.  She knows that there lurks in the back of the minds of some disturbed people the black specter of self-slaughter.  Hence, a stern reminder of the eternal consequences of informed and willed suicide is embedded in what seems to many today to be a cold law.

Yes, yes, we all know the perfectly accurate insights of saints such as St. John Vianney about what might happen in the mind of a suicide between the bridge and the water.  But this compassionate optimism mustn’t make us stupid.    These days suicide is on the rise and states are actively abetting this subcategory of homicide.   The option of suicide is moving forward like a juggernaut.  Will the Church stand in its path or simply cede the moral ground … again?

Each and every case of suicide is its own case and merits individual consideration.  However, there remains great wisdom in the severe stand that our forebears developed over a great deal of time and from oceans and oceans of tears, both of the despairing and of the surviving.   Just as God did not impose the Decalogue in order to ruin what otherwise might have been a good time in this earthly life, so too, the Church did not come up with laws about cemeteries and suicides to be cruel.  In another moral issue, there is a reason why the parishes and dioceses make the decision to terminate the employment in schools of open and active homosexuals.   It is not mere cruelty.  It’s called avoidance of scandal.   Not to terminate would be both more cruel and an abdication of God-given responsibility for souls.

And even to suggest the opposite is mean-spirited and pusillanimous to the enth.

It is a common tactic of those who coddle immorality to launch the word “cruel” at the Church for laws and teachings that have been inspired by God and verified for centuries.  think of a 16 year girl screaming, “I HATE YOU!” at her father who won’t let her leave the house dressed like a whore.

So many today have gone flaccid in the face of evil. Straightening the back and saying, “No!” is not in vogue.  It remains, however, the primary job of a mother, and especially of a father, to say “No” to their children, precisely because they love their children and don’t want them to hurt themselves.  Saying, “No”, is hard-wired into the job of being a parent.

Saying, “No”, and often, is the what Popes, bishops and priests are supposed to do, and for a very good reason: people have a real talent for hurting themselves.

This business with “Bob” is what happens when false compassion snuffs out reason and 2000 years of history and 3000 years of divine revelation and eons of the natural law.

Finally – ceterumsomething must be done about Jesuits, in general and in particular.

____

Originally Published on: Aug 27, 2019 @ 16:16

A friend sent this with the single word:

“Vile.”

The story from Associated Press is:

The day he picked to die, he had the party of a lifetime

The story is about a 75 year old man, homosexual, Catholic, with a background of suicidal tendencies, terminally ill with cancer, who made use of the Washington state “Death with Dignity Act” to kill himself, surrounded by helpers, etc. “Aid in dying” is allowed. They had a party, he announced his intention, and injected himself.

[…]

Fuller began returning more often to the Catholic church he had long attended. His spiritual views were hardly orthodox – he considered himself a shaman, and described his impending death as a state of “perpetual meditation” – but Seattle’s St. Therese Parish was known for accommodating a range of beliefs. Fuller was beloved there, and he craved the community. He had sung in the gospel choir and read scriptures from the lectern during services, sometimes delivering insightful or funny remarks off the cuff, said Kent Stevenson, the choir’s director.

Stevenson credited the “tenacity and clarity” of Fuller’s choice.

“It was hard to even cry because he was so forthcoming and so sober about it,” Stevenson said. “He was just so outrageously unique and such a character, this was completely in keeping with who Bob was.”

The Roman Catholic Church opposes aid-in-dying laws, citing the sanctity of life. But Fuller’s decision was widely known and accepted among the parishioners. At the service where he received his last communion on May 5, the Rev. Quentin Dupont brought over a group of white-clad children who were receiving their first communion.

They raised their arms and blessed him.

[…]

There’s a photo of the moment.  UPDATE: The Archdiocese of Seattle issued a statement saying that, at the time of the photo, the “the parish leadership was not aware of Mr. Fuller’s intentions.”  HERE

Something twitched in the back of my mind, so I did a search for “Quentin Dupont”.

SJ

Ahhh…. how to romanticize suicide!

[…]

In the kitchen, two volunteers with the nonprofit End of Life Washington mixed the drugs and Kahlua in a glass measuring cup. They said they considered themselves to be like midwives, helping usher people out of the world instead of into it.

“You know if you do this, if you put this in your system, you’ll go to sleep and you won’t wake up?” one, Stephanie Murray, told him as she delivered the syringes.

“I do,” Fuller answered.

Fuller plunged the syringes.

After a few moments of tense quiet, he led his friends in singing, “I’m so glad we had this time together,” the sign-off from the old Carol Burnett television show.

His eyes closed for longer and longer periods.

“I’m still here,” he said.

And then, he wasn’t.

It’s like something from Lord Of The World.

US HERE – UK HERE

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
This entry was posted in Jesuits, Pò sì jiù, The Coming Storm, The future and our choices and tagged , . Bookmark the permalink.

37 Comments

  1. Gab says:

    An important update from the Archdiocese of Seattle on this matter. http://www.seattlearchdiocese.org/Assets/ARCH/Sanctity-of-Life-Statement-08272019.pdf

  2. iamlucky13 says:

    May the Lord in His mercy grant Robert Fuller perpetual rest.

    How tragic the way his pastor appears to have chosen to “accompany” him. I’m trying to stifle the image that comes to mind of the deceased telling those in his parish he’s thinking about suicide, and getting a “Yeah, sure. Whatever,” in response.

    And what a scandal to the parish, especially the children.

    We have a new coadjutator bishop in Seattle to assist our Archbishop who’s health is ailing – Archbishop Etienne, formerly from Anchorage. I pray for his prudence in knowing whether and how to address this tragic and now very public decision by one of his flock.

  3. Mike says:

    If you’re a bishop and you let Jesuits operate in your diocese, you are culpable for the loss of souls.

  4. Rob83 says:

    Death isn’t a subject one hears too much from the pulpit these days, and it is terrifying how many people in casual conversation will endorse the idea of either being put to sleep like a pet or otherwise killing themselves if faced with a terminal disease.

    The tragedy is so many people think they are ending their suffering for good through planned assisted suicide when the reality may be that that soft slip into death is the last peace they ever have.

  5. SanSan says:

    Scandalous! I can’t believe that this priest would subject innocent children to this crap. Bring out the millstones! Lord have mercy.

  6. SanSan says:

    Gab: thank you for post. I pray that this was the case. That the children and priest were only aware of sickness and were praying for healing. Tragic.

  7. Amerikaner says:

    A troubled man and a troubled parish.

  8. Matthew says:

    “sometimes delivering insightful or funny remarks off the cuff, ”

    It is bad enough when the priest does that, now the new age lectors want in on it.

  9. Gaetano says:

    From the article:
    “Whether such deaths do constitute suicide is a semantic debate. In Washington and other states with aid-in-dying laws, coroners are forbidden from categorizing the deaths as suicides; instead, they list natural causes. Opponents, including the American Medical Association, maintain that “assisted suicide” is more accurate.”

    It is not a semantic debate. It is a battle of reality vs. fiction. These people are taking their own lives by a deliberate act. It is most certainly not death by natural causes.
    No state statute or policy can change that reality, no matter what the law prohibits the coroner to conclude. I imagine advocates know this, since they must use the power of the state to deny it.

  10. teomatteo says:

    Assisted Suicide. Complicit Murder. Our society hangs by a thread, a thread made up of our words.

  11. dbf223 says:

    I am reminded of the novel Quo Vadis, which ends with the wealthy patrician character Petronius taking his own life. Petronius was a high ranking member of Nero’s court who knew that he would eventually fall out of favor with Nero. He rejects a number of attempts by St. Paul and others to repent and believe the gospel, and when Nero eventually throws a wild orgy to cap off his life. As his last act, he destroys a particularly beautiful piece of pottery he owned, which he knew Nero coveted, in order to prevent Nero from possessing it, and then opens his veins and bleeds out while listening to poetry (the typical Roman manner).

    The world has already known this wickedness, and the early Christians knew well enough to call it a heinous evil.

    It is particularly disgusting that this all took place in relation to a church dedicated to St. Therese. She suffered terribly at the end of her life and accepted her death with grace. What a response to the witness of St. Therese!

  12. Suburbanbanshee says:

    Confusion, wickedness, and a horrendous apathy pretending to be love.

    Dear God, it is at times like this that car crashes don’t seem nearly as bad a way to go. Sometimes you are showing your mercy. To die like this man, in the midst of “friends,” would be worse than dying at the hands of enemies.

    I hope and pray that he died penitent, even for a moment. He died a worse death than a dog, unmourned.

  13. Suburbanbanshee says:

    From reading the article, it is clear that the dead man suffered from suicidal depression all his life, and had attempted suicide and sought self-destruction multiple times in multiple ways. God kept him alive through many dangers.

    But this parish… This Catholic parish had parishioners who acted as accessories to self-murder. They stood in God’s way. Sickening.

  14. LarryW2LJ says:

    “the parish leadership was not aware of Mr. Fuller’s intentions.” – and I have a bridge in Brooklyn that’s for sale, if anyone is interested.

  15. Stepheno says:

    Very sad. My father is 95 with dementia. He’s waiting for the day Lord takes him. My mother is 93 and is right by his side as she has been these past 67 years. After visiting them past weekend I can’t help but feel overwhelming sadness for this vile act and the loonies who supported that man.

  16. monstrance says:

    The Pacific NW has gone full tilt looney tunes.
    From the crazies in Portland to this.
    New Bishop coming into Seattle – pray the Good Lord gives him courage.
    Maybe he can join forces with Arch Bishop Sample.

  17. ajf1984 says:

    I was struck by this quotation from the now-deceased: ” ‘Why should I suffer?’ he said. ‘I’m totally at peace with this.’ ” Why suffer?

    1. In reparation for the sins of mankind.
    2. To unite yourself as closely as possible to the Suffering Savior.
    3. To give the world, as our sainted Pope John Paul II did, an example of what it means to be fully committed to the sanctity of human life.
    4. As a witness to the true dignity of humanity, that we’re not merely animals.

    I can think of more reasons–NOT that I wish anyone to suffer unnecessarily, of course! But what a gift he could have given to those around him, which he has now deprived them of!

  18. grateful says:

    Forgive them Father, they know not what they do.

  19. BrionyB says:

    What a horrific and sad story. I could hardly bear to read it. I pray for that poor man’s soul, that God will be merciful and take into account all he has struggled with during his life. Though that comment about his “tenacity and clarity” is chilling… but perhaps there’s a chance he had a moment of repentance at the very end?

    I had the same thought as ajf1984 about “why should I suffer”. Imagine if Our Lord, in the garden of Gethsemane, had considered his imminent Passion, said “why should I suffer”, and walked away. Instead, He said, “not My will, but Thine, be done” (echoing, of course, Our Lady’s “let it be done unto me according to Thy word”).

    Of course this is easier to say than to do. It’s natural to fear pain and suffering, and late-stage cancer can bring terrible pain; no doubt many of us have seen a relative or friend go through it. That’s we must all pray for the grace of a good death, and for the courage to face what we must when the time comes.

  20. Ultrarunner says:

    Father Dupont won’t get busted for his full spiritual participation in Fuller’s suicide. Father Dupont won’t get busted for deploying an unbelievable plausible deniability story to his Bishop. Unfortunately, however, the future Mr Dupont has made the Archdiocese appear incompetent in conducting an internal investigation which publicly cleared him of any wrongdoing. That breaks the first two rules of fight club. There will be hell to pay.

    https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2019/08/28/facebook-posts-contradict-seattle-archdiocese-claims-on-parishioners-planned-suicide/

  21. Gaetano says:

    There is a further update:

    In a March 16 Facebook post, Fuller claimed that he had completed the legal steps required to receive a prescription of life-ending drugs, and that he had the approval of a priest to end his own life.

    “I have absolutely no reservations about what I am doing,” he wrote. “And my pastor/sponsor has given me his blessings. And he’s a Jesuit!!!”

  22. St. Alphonsus says that the thing a sinner most wants as death approaches is just one more day, or one more hour, or one more minute; but he will not get it. How horrible, to have been given the time but to throw it away.

  23. Im4truth4all says:

    “We shall find out at the day of judgment that the greater number of Christians who are lost were damned because they did not know their own religion.” – St. Jean-Marie Vianney

    “A priest goes to Heaven or a priest goes to Hell with a thousand people behind.” – St. Jean-Marie Vianney

  24. LarryW2LW: My thoughts exactly. Plausible deniability is a crutch to avoid taking responsibility when your actions become widely known.

    “Senator, to the best of my memory, I have no recollection of hearing anything concerning that topic…”

    And thinking it’s on the parts of the congregation, pastor, and ‘big house’ downtown. You can show clean hands if you studiously keep your fingers in your ears when discussion of events you know are wrong come up.

  25. RosaryRose says:

    #5. Thou shall not kill.

    Don’t remember a footnote being given to Moses. Footnote as in: “unless you talk to a Jesuit. Then, yeah, go ahead! Kill yourself!” Under #6 the Jesuit’s have “Sodomize! It’s all good!” Seriously? Because that’s what it looks like to me.

    Mary Queen of Heaven and Earth pray for us!

    I thank God for the opportunity to use my pain and suffering as an offering to God. My words are weak and I am not a good evangelist or teacher. I am so concerned for our Church, our priests, all the souls being mislead. I weep at the offenses and indifferences towards the Blessed Sacrament, and I know that I am no one, I can change nothing on my own. But I have a body housing my soul, and I will be offering all pain and suffering for the salvation of souls, the restoration of the Holy Catholic Church, and the strengthening of our priests and all leaders.

    Offering rosaries too.

  26. fmsb78 says:

    The future Pope of the Restoration will have to either suppress the Jesuits for good or purge and rebuild from the one or two orthodox jesuits left.

  27. Nell says:

    There’s now a second statement from the Archdiocese of Seattle:

    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE August 28, 2019
    The Associated Press news story naturally leads the reader to assume certain things about the priest and his intentions. However, we are learning a very different reality was at work. We looked into this and can confirm that the priest who did the blessing did not know about Mr. Fuller’s intentions. The priest was a visiting priest who happened to be at St. Therese that particular Sunday when the pastor was celebrating Mass at his second parish. The blessing was done after Mass by the priest whose interest was to bring comfort to someone he learned was dying. The priest was not aware of any news photographer, although he was aware people were taking pictures.

    While it is clear that some of Mr. Fuller’s friends atthe parish knew of his intentions, the pastor at St. Therese initially did not. Mr. Fuller eventually approached the pastor to ask to plan his own funeral. The pastor discussed the gift of life and tried to convince him to change his mind. He made it clear that neither he nor the parish could support his plan to take his own life. Once it was clear that Mr. Fuller was not going to change his mind, the pastor reached out to his leadership to discuss the situation.

    Archbishop Sartain agreed that it is the church’s responsibility to pastorally care for those who mourn. With this in mind, he gave permission for the funeral with certain conditions to ensure there was no endorsement or other perceived support for the way in which Mr. Fuller ended his life. The purpose of the funeral was to pray for his soul and bring comfort and consolation to those who mourned.

    http://www.seattlearchdiocese.org/Assets/ARCH/SanctityOfLifeStatement-rev01.pdf

  28. RLseven says:

    Unfortunately, we know from the priest sexual abuse crisis that lack of accountability and cover-ups by bishops are part of our Church history now. It seems like integrity is becoming an endangered species, even in the Church. If the pastor knew about his parishioner’s intentions and gave his blessing, he is wrong–even if it came from a compassionate place. If the diocese or bishop are covering up to save their reputation or protect the pastor, they are wrong. Life is sacred. ALL life is sacred– pre-birth, throughout all of life, and until natural death. All people. Everywhere. That is a core value in our Catholic Faith.

    On another note, I feel badly that now the connection is being made that Jesuit = complicit with assisted suicide. I’m beginning to become sympathetic to the order, the more they are judged and persecuted. Honestly, I don’t think these men are any more or less holy than other groups of priests.

  29. Holy Mackerel says:

    The focus on “what did the priests know, and when did they know it?” strikes me as misplaced. What about the laity? Last time I checked, we had the same baptismal vocation, the same duty to avoid cooperation with evil, and the same duty to avoid scandal (although obviously the clerical state is an aggravating fact.) If I were a Catholic in Seattle, and it were settled that the priests in and around the parish didn’t have foreknowledge of the suicide, I still wouldn’t feel a whole lot better.

  30. Charles E Flynn says:
  31. Gab says:

    This entire situation is incredibly sad for all concerned, living and dead, and even those looking in from the outside. What effects this will have on the Faithful, here and into the future is unknown. I can’t help but see the ripples of Modernism in all of this.

    Pope St Pius X, ora pro nobis.

  32. Nell says:

    From the interview with Fr. Dupont:

    How have you felt since this story has come out?

    I am shocked. I feel absolutely terrible about the confusion that has arisen out of this story, and I feel that the archdiocese in both statements has done its best to let people know what actually happened and how this story came to be. It has been a difficult few days. The last thing I want to do is be part of a confusion, and I certainly have no desire to question the church’s teaching on the sanctity of life. I believe that life is a gift. I believe that it is a gift from God and an opportunity every day to learn from God and love as God is trying to teach us to love though scriptures and the examples of Christ and the saints. I feel terrible that there is an insinuation that I, or a member of the clergy or religious order or this archdiocese, would think otherwise or would make a public statement otherwise. It’s been a tough couple of days because I love the church and I feel like I tried to respond appropriately, pastorally to what I knew of the situation at hand, and it was actually an entirely different situation and it’s being made to cause confusion and I absolutely dislike that.

    https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2019/08/30/father-quentin-dupont-responds-ap-story-assisted-suicide-catholic-man-seattle

  33. Nell says:

    “That said, why choose that parish to go to for Sunday Mass… ever? Why that parish, when I suspect he could chose others and be welcomed.”

    Perhaps he chose that parish because he and the pastor there are maybe friends? The pastor, Fr. Maurice Mamba, is from Africa, and Fr. Dupont spent time in campus ministry work there. Also, Fr. Dupont taught microeconomics and business ethics for a while at Seattle University, and Fr. Mamba completed an MBA course there during that time.

    http://www.jesuits.org/story-details?TN=PROJECT-20140609022506&MTN=57890B36-8D75-4986-B454-985D44ED57C9
    https://www.stmp.org/73

  34. Nell says:

    “That said, why choose that parish to go to for Sunday Mass… ever? Why that parish, when I suspect he could chose others and be welcomed.”

    Perhaps he chose that parish because he and the pastor there are maybe friends? The pastor, Fr. Maurice Mamba, is from Africa, and Fr. Dupont spent time in campus ministry work there. Also, Fr. Dupont taught microeconomics and business ethics for a while at Seattle University, and Fr. Mamba completed an MBA course there during that time.

  35. Kathleen10 says:

    My sister, God rest her soul, suffered greatly from colon cancer for two years before she passed. The last year was rough. A demure and modest woman, she endured the indignities that accompany such a disease, not to mention pain, fear, and suffering. She endured it courageously right to the end, never seeking out a method to just end it despite knowing the time was coming. That would not have been in her thinking, she carried her cross and would let God decide. But to this crazy, mixed up and confused world, Robert Fuller, who took an injection and died peacefully in his sleep, “died with dignity”.

  36. Mightnotbeachristiantou says:

    There are a lot of things going on in this case, but I would like to give another angle on opposing suicide. It is not murder, but theft.
    1 Corinthians 6:20 (KJV)
    For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.
    Non-christians might have a right what they do with their lives, but legally Christians do not own their lives so they can not do any thing they want with them. To tose it away is to steal it from He who owns it.
    Since he he has tried suicide before and He who owns it has not granted it to him it is quite obvious what his intention He had for the life He owned. He stole God’s property.
    If one wants to go around usurping God’s will habe the decency not to go around call yourself Christian. If you are going to go around usurping Catholic doctrine, stop pretending to be Catholic. And stop asking for Catholic rites.

  37. dcntodd says:

    “So many today have gone flaccid in the face of evil. Straightening the back and saying, “No!” is not in vogue. It remains, however, the primary job of a mother, and especially of a father, to say “No” to their children, precisely because they love their children and don’t want them to hurt themselves. Saying, “No”, is hard-wired into the job of being a parent.”

    Seems we haven’t learned a thing since the Fall. Adam failed, as Guardian of God’s Law, to name evil for what it is and tell his wife ‘no’ when she entered into Satan’s game and took the fruit. Will we ever learn????

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