follow the money (Phil edition)

Get Religion mentions a WV bishop who gifted a lot of money to other bishops, mainly asking about the dogmatic and religious points of view in the story (i.e. another liberal bishop fighting believing Catholic people and priests who are old fashioned)

They correctly point out that a lot of money is just given out to the poor who come to the door so doesn't get in the books, but they don't dig into the real question: Was he gifting the money to get them to look the other way?

Note to non Yanks: West Virginia, best known for it's coal mines, is one of the poorest areas of the USA. Reminds me of Altoona, where the bishop gave lots of money around from a charitable organization, according to The Wanderer (a "far right" Catholic paper),who published a series on him in 1996...I am trying to find the link, but the bishop's accountability page notes:

In the course of the series of articles, allegations were made that Bishop Adamec had purchased his bishopric, with a multi-million dollar donation to the building of the U.S. bishops’ new headquarters in Washington, D.C. near the campus of the Catholic University of America. Allegedly, Adamec obtained the funds through the Slovak Federation. The allegations published by The Wanderer received no official response, but at that year’s meeting of the conference of bishops, the bishops spent most of their executive session discussing punitive actions against The Wanderer for publishing the expose on Adamec.

and then there was the money links with Cardinal McCarrick. I post from my personal blog, and the links are to the modern Jeramiah, Ann Barnhart, who if you look past her vulgarity, usually hits the nail of the nead:

Crazy Ann says follow the money to find out why ex Cardinal McCarrick got away with a lot.
What is the link between American "papal foundation" funding a "dermatology hospital", a child trafficker, a dead whistleblowing hooker, and the Pope?

Here in the Philippines, the church is in high gear against Duterte's drug war (i.e. thehit squads. )

But of course, Cardinal Tagle of Manila is running for Pope, and so he has to stay on the politically correct side of the issue.

And of course, the SJW are too busy lamenting Duterte to bother pointing fingers at the corruption let alone do anything about it (maybe because everyone is related to everyone else among the elite here, so you might end up criticizing one of your family, which is taboo).

Duterte, however, is not so sanguine: he routinely curses out the bishops, which make the SJW hyperventillate and the ordinary folks cheer.

Duterte was molested as a boy, so he holds a grudge. But maybe he also knows that some of the bishops etc. are as corrupt as the politicians.

The anti Duterte webzine Rappler had an editorial discussing both sides of the feud,. He notes the church is good at helping the victims of the drug war, but unless they clear up their own corruption, they will begin to lose public trust.

From the Rappler, from 2012: Bishop accused of diverting millions.

the layfolk complained and the article says that the issue was sent to the Vatican to investigate.

and the bishop said he'd resign if the Vatican decided he did something wrong.

But last time I looked, the Bishop is still there.

this 2014 article in the Rappler examines the finances of the Manila diocese and the church in general.

Here, the bishop resist inspection because a lot of money is just given out without doing the paper work, so you don't know if it goes to the poor or is diverted. This opens you to both fraud and the accusations of fraud where nothing wrong was done.

but as Rappler points out: having financial experts do the paperwork to track the money might not help: a lot of the money is being stolen by experts supposed to be doing the paperwork

 The Church financial adviser said there had been incidents where Church funds were abused and misused by the very financial experts they trusted. The victims are not only the dioceses, but even some religious congregations. “There were cases where millions of funds disappeared after these were entrusted to these so-called experts.”

sounds about right.

How bad is it?

It's so bad even the Pope is worried. (2015 article).

He said he was approached by two government officials who had a compelling offer.

“‘You have so much need here with so many poor,’” the pope recalled them saying. He said they offered him the equivalent of US$400,000. “I listened because when the offer is so big, the offer challenges even a saint. But they went on: ‘To do this, we make the deposit and then you give us half for ourselves.’”

The offer shocked the future pope. “In that moment I thought about what I would do: either I insult them and give them a kick where the sun doesn’t shine, or I play the fool,” he said. “I played the fool.”

Pope Francis said he politely declined the offer, suggesting the government officials donate the money — with a receipt. “We must ask for forgiveness for these Catholics, those Christians who cause a scandal because of their corruption,” he said.

but of course, he didn't embarass them by naming names or reporting them...

So who is okay with infanticide

This is moved from my main blog, and another version is on my medical blog.

But the essay won't "come together" so I'm posting it here for safe keeping.

------------------------------------
Damien Thompson quit his post as editor of the UKCatholic Herald because "the new owners” and he “do not agree on the future direction of the company.”

Satireblog EcclesIsSaved explains:

Following a take-over of the Sovereign Order of the Catholic Herald, its Grandmaster-in-chief, Fra' Damian Thompson, has quit his position because of "a difference of opinion"...

Fra' Thompson's "In some ways, possibly, well, one might argue, without making too much of this, that the bishops' response to the court decision was less than it might have been had it been more than it was" was itself a watered-down version of what he originally wrote, namely, "Ye brood of vipers, who hath shewed you to flee from the wrath to come?"


Now that he is a free man and doesn't have to kiss the tushes of the powerful be subtle, he gives his opinions to Raymond Arroyo in an interview.

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but the best part of the interview starts at 10 minutes, discussing the Amazon synod and calls it a "PC Disney production... Avatar written by octagenarian European socialists..."

one of these days I'll read the long wordy document put out by the Vatican (make it long enough, and people's eyes will glaze over and they will miss the fine print)... but the idea behind the document is that the Amazon tribe resembles Rousseau's noble savage and has much to teach the western world.

Why yes, indigenous folks can teach the west a lot.

But why chose tribes who essentially have degenerated into tribal tyrannies that kidnap women and kill children as your example?

Anthropologists even argue that outsiders shouldn't interfere with this (i.e. save the kid or give them an alternative to infanticide).

Reality check:

In pre colonial days, the MaShona tribe of Southern Africa killed twins (who would normally die of malnutrition)...As soon as the missionaries set up schools and clinics, and there were ways to supply formula to the moms, such killing stopped.

In contrast,the UKTelegraph has a story about when the tribal elders ordered the murder, the parents killed themselves rather than kill their child. (the child was saved by an uncle and eventually adopted by Protestant missionaries).

Wikipedia page on the book Darkness in ElDorado has details on several scandals concerning the Amazon tribe so beloved of the Vatican: one scandal is pedophilia and sexual exploitation, the other is experimental measles vaccine that killed quite a few folks.

both these scandals; more HERE. and HERE.

or just watch the film:



so the synod document wants people to learn from the indigenous.
one wag had a tweet wondering why the Vatican didn't ask the indigenous tribes of Great Britain for their wisdom.

I myself wonder: If they want input from a non western culture, why not ask the Chinese bishops to give some input on the subject?

Oh I forgot: Those bishops are pissed off for Francis and his pedophile friend for giving the Chinese church to the communist government...

but that is another story for another day

a longer version of this is on my medical blog.