Welcome

We ended our March 2002 article on the Church and pro abortion Cardinals promising more along the same line. Due to circumstances we did not devote time to the web page during the past year but chose to work in a different format. Promises are made to be kept and we will return to our original format, but world conditions prompt us to address recent troublesome issues.

While we know that the state has stepped in to address the recent sex scandals of accused priests and young people, this is not a new problem, and in the past the Church had very effective ways of dealing with deviant and perverted persons who managed to work their way through seminaries and become Roman Catholic priests. Some of them (sexual deviants) no doubt are very weak men (and no doubt women religious too) who are miserable sinners and as St. Peter Damien shows, the Church knew exactly how to deal with them. Others may (in a more conspiracy related kind of thought) might have been deliberately planted in order to bring disgrace upon the Church at some moment in time. Whatever, there has been a failure at the level of the seminary to screen out unacceptable candidates for the priesthood at the least, and according to some, there has been a deliberate leaning toward unsuitable candidates and a bias toward good men. Whatever the final analysis is (history will tell the tale,) St. Peter Damien long ago was very aware of the problem and laid out a plan to deal with this unfortunate and mortal sin; a plan which took into account the souls of the sinners as well as the victims. Might be some small comfort in these turbulent times to know that this is nothing new and that the Church will survive this.

Thanks to Randy Engel for her research and wisdom exhibited by drawing upon the lives of the Saints for our own edification and instruction. Thanks to her for permission to reprint her work on my website.

Mary Jo Heiland