Women imprisoned for miscarriage in El Salvador

via Truth-out:

Seventeen women, ages 19 to 30 years old at their sentencing, remain in prison in El Salvador as international pressure rises to exonerate them. The women were all convicted on the charge of "aggravated homicide" of a newborn. At least one of them underwent a psychiatric evaluation and exhibited intellectual disabilities. Most of them suffered miscarriages, premature births or stillbirths; all of them were poor and without access to prenatal care or obstetrical services; and the majority of them have been sentenced to - and are serving - 30 years in prison. According to Julia Evelyn Martínez, university professor of economics in El Salvador and social advocate, these women have been wrongly accused and convicted of the crime of murder.

"One needs to understand that all of these cases deal with women who have lived and continue to live in situations of extreme financial need, without social support networks or access to quality health services," Martinez said. "Most of them had obstetrical problems during their pregnancies and suffered miscarriages or went through childbirth without either health or medical care. They arrived at public hospitals unconscious, bleeding, in search of assistance, at which point, in flagrant violation of professional ethics, they were reported, tried and sentenced, first for abortion and then for aggravated homicide, forcing them out of hospital and into prison." Martínez goes on to describe the legal maneuvering that led to these women's convictions and is keeping them in prison.

… These women are not accused of abortion, but of aggravated homicide, and therefore are not eligible for pardon. But what they disingenuously forget to say is that all of these women were first accused of abortion, and that in the process of their trial, prosecutors and/or judges made the decision to change the charge to aggravated homicide, in case the prosecution could not present convincing evidence that the deaths of these newborns were intentionally caused by the women.

Abortion is completely banned in El Salvador, no matter what the circumstances. The Constitution was modified in 1999 to include the recognition of life at the moment of conception. According to the Feminist Collective for Local Development in El Salvador (Colectiva Feminista para el desarrollo local de El SalvadorColectiva Feminista para el desarrollo local de El Salvador):

Presently - thanks to the powerful lobby of the Catholic Church, prolife groups and the conservative political right - Salvadoran lawmakers have eliminated all exceptions that would allow a woman to resort to an abortion. Article 133 of the Penal Code in force strenuously condemns any type of abortion. Under the current law, a person who carries out an abortion with the consent of the carrier or a woman who induces an abortion may be condemned to prison with sentences from 2 to 12 years.

Under the law, there is no legal separation between miscarriage or spontaneous abortion and abortion that is induced. So all types of pregnancy interruptions that result in the death of the fetus are potentially considered as homicides. Again from the Collective:

"In addition to the illegality of abortion is the lack of a clear legal definition of what is an abortion and/or pregnancy interruption. Spontaneous abortions and premature deliveries of advanced pregnancies that result in the death of the fetus are considered to have been provoked by the woman and are, therefore, homicides."

In fact, there are many more women in prison for abortion than these 17. According to the Free the 17 Association (Plataforma Libertad para las 17), more than 125 women are imprisoned for that "crime," serving sentences ranging from 11- 40 years.

But for these 17 women, the particulars of their cases and the fact that they were so egregiously mishandled in court should make them eligible for pardon, even under the country's draconian antiabortion laws. The question remains whether the legal switch to accusations of murder can be overcome as well.

Libertad para las 17 and the Feminist Collective have spearheaded the campaign to release the women in El Salvador. In March, they presented a petition to the government requesting a pardon. They call their campaign, "A Flower for the 17" (Una flor por las 17).

El Salvador’s Total Abortion Ban Is Driving Pregnant Teens To Commit Suicide

note: El Salvador has the highest rate of teen pregnancy in all of Latin America, no doubt due to the lack of availability of birth control combined with the lack of sex education. These are the real world results of Catholic doctrine, and the work of Catholic secret societies attempting to subvert democratic governance.

via Think Progress

In El Salvador, home to one of the most restrictive abortion bans in the world, teen pregnancy is a leading cause of suicide. That’s because desperate teens, many of whom have become pregnant through rape, don’t feel like they have any other options, according to health officials working in the country. The link between the culture of violence against women, the harsh abortion restrictions, and the suicide rate has become increasingly clear to groups working in El Salvador. Last year, sexual crimes in the country rose by 17 percent, and two thirds of reported rapes were committed against girls under the age of 18. Recent data shows that half of the teens who commit suicide are pregnant when they take their lives.

“There’s a correlation between sexual violence and the high rate of suicides among adolescents — that’s the reality. Pregnancy is a determining factor behind teenage suicides,” Mario Soriano, the head of the program for youth and adolescent development at El Salvador’s health ministry, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in an interview this week. According to Soriano, despite El Salvador’s high rates of teenage pregnancy, the girls who become pregnant are typically seen as outcasts in their conservative Catholic communities. They are often kicked out of the house, dumped by their boyfriends, and even expelled from school to avoid setting a “bad example” for other students. Rather than risk this type of rejection, many girls choose to resort to desperate measures.

Since abortion is illegal under any circumstances in El Salvador, even girls who have been victims of rape or incest are forced to seek out an illegal procedure if they want to end their pregnancies. According to estimates from El Salvador’s Ministry of Health, about 6,500 clandestine abortions take place every year, and about a quarter of those occur among girls under 18. Advocacy groups like Amnesty International say the real numbers are likely much higher.

Even aside from the risk of dying — something that results from about 11 percent of the illegal procedures in El Salvador — it’s very dangerous to end a pregnancy there. The women who are convicted of having an abortion can land in jail for decades. Even the women who have miscarriages, and weren’t intentionally trying to end their pregnancies, can be charged with aggravated homicide.

These dynamics haven’t escaped international scrutiny. Earlier this week, twelve countries — including Canada, the Czech Republic, Spain, and Sweden, among others — called on El Salvador to fulfill its obligations to the United Nations Human Rights Council by decriminalizing abortion.

“The chorus of countries worldwide calling for El Salvador to end its unjust abortion ban is growing ever larger and louder,” Nancy Northup, the president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, said in a statement at the time. “The Salvadoran government cannot ignore the calls any longer, and must not be allowed to evade accountability for the human rights abuses that countless women continue to suffer.”

Amnesty International, which has been pressuring El Salvador to amend its abortion ban for months, frequently criticizes the country for killing its women and girls. The international organization says that the harsh abortion restrictions are akin to torture, particularly because even women in life-threatening situations aren’t always allowed to legally end their pregnancies. The United Nations has also warned El Salvador that its draconian abortion laws are a violation of human rights.

While the majority of countries around the world don’t have abortions bans as harsh as El Salvador’s, these dynamics are not necessarily specific to Salvadoran citizens. Globally, an estimated 47,000 women die from unsafe abortions every year. And even here in the United States, where abortion remains legal under Roe v. Wade, a mounting number of state-level barriers to the procedure puts it out of reach for some vulnerable women — particularly poor people and people of color. When those individuals are unable to exercise their abortion rights, there’s some evidence to suggest that being forced to carry unwanted pregnancies to term increases their risk of mental health issues and economic hardship.

The Knights of Columbus and child abuse cover-up*

This post contains details that may be upsetting for sensitive readers.

The Knights of Columbus (KOC) are commonly known as the world's largest Catholic fraternal service organization, but most people don't know that the Knights also function as a recruiting organization for highly exclusive Catholic equestrian orders such as the Knights of Malta and the Order of the Holy Sepulchre. The history of equestrian orders dates back to Ancient Rome, where the order comprised a large proportion of the patrician classes that monopolized the Roman political process, as well as most major commercial enterprises. Today, this same oligarchical tradition is continued through Catholic equestrian orders that subvert the democratic process by way of quasi-political religious organizations. While the KOC does not represent the upper echelons of the Catholic cryptocracy, that dubious honor instead being designated for the equestrian orders noted above, their political influence as an arm of the Vatican has been significant enough to play a role in silencing countless victims of clerical abuse.

The photo above captures the opening Mass of the 131st annual Knights of Columbus convention on August 6 in San Antonio. Included in the photo is church leader Cardinal Roger Mahoney, who the New York Times states "worked quietly to keep evidence of child molesting away from law enforcement officials and shield abusive priests from criminal prosecution more than a decade before the scandal became public, according to confidential church records." The article continues, "Rather than defrocking priests and contacting the police, the archdiocese sent priests who had molested children to out-of-state treatment facilities...Ray Boucher, a lawyer representing some of the plaintiffs in those cases, said the files released on Monday were “particularly damning,” because they showed the “wanton disregard for the health and safety of children, and a decision by the highest members of the church to put its self-interest and the interest of abusive priests ahead of those of children.”"

Also pictured above is Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who has been accused of sexual assault by former Benectine monk and Catholic priest Richard Sipe. According to Sipe, "On file are the unsealed “MEDIATION DOCUMENTATION FOR FR. G.” that involved McCarrick and the dioceses of Metuchen and Newark, NJ. A financial settlement was reached. The case was sent to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome, but it has not yet responded." What follows is an excerpt of the events described in the mediation document:

“He put his arms around me and wrapped his legs around mine. Then He started to tell me what a nice young man I was and what a good priest I would make someday. He also told me about the hard work and stress he was facing in his new role as Archbishop of Newark. He told me how everyone knows him and how powerful he was. The Archbishop kept saying, “Pray for your poor uncle.” All of a sudden, I felt paralyzed. I didn’t have my own car and there was nowhere to go. The Archbishop started to kiss me and move his hands and legs around me. I remained frozen, curled up like a ball. I felt his penis inside his underwear leaning against my buttocks as he was rubbing my legs up and down. His hands were moving up and down my chest and back, while tightening his legs around mine. I tried to scream but could not…I was paralyzed with fear. As he continued touching me, I felt more afraid. He even tried several times to force his hands under my shorts. He tried to roll me over so that he could get on top of me, but I resisted, I felt sick and disgusted and finally was able to jump out of bed. I went into the bathroom where I vomited several times and started to cry. After twenty minutes in the bathroom, the Archbishop told me to come back to bed. Instead I went to the recliner and pretended to fall asleep.”

A news article reports that the Knights of Columbus sponsored a youth group, the Squires, members of which have accused the KOC of collaborating to cover of child sexual abuse. The article states "In one of the lawsuits, an unnamed Kansas resident claims the Squires leader abused him from 1978, when he was 10 years old, until 1986. He claims the leader shared him with other youth counselors in the group and threatened to kill him if he told anyone, the lawsuit said. The second lawsuit came from Texas resident Jim Dennany, who said he alerted Knights of Columbus officials in 1986 to assaults he said he suffered in the 1970s when he was a young teenager. He claimed the group took no action, concealed the allegations and told him to keep quiet, according to the lawsuit."

According to former Domnican priest and canon lawyer Thomas Doyle, "The Knights of Columbus take great pride in their loyalty to the Church and to the bishops. They regularly show their support for priests and announce their love for the Church. They shell out barrels of money to the Vatican, to bishops, to seminaries and to other causes in support of priests. The Knights of Columbus have totally missed the boat. They have supported priests and bishops in their moral bankruptcy and in their destruction of the bodies and souls of the victims of abuse. They have said and done nothing to support the victims."

So it may not be much of a surprise that a Pennsyvania newspaper, the Observer-Reporter, reported that convicted pedophile Jerry Sandusky was awarded Coach of the Year title by the KOC. Sandusky has also been a speaker at KOC events. Former FBI Director Louis Freeh was assigned to investigate the Sandusky scandal. "We will immediately report any evidence of criminality to law enforcement authorities," said Freeh. New York state newspaper The Journal News reports that Louis Freeh, along with suspected Russian spy Robert Hanssen, are both members of the secretive Catholic fraternty Opus Dei. In his book, Their Kingdom Come: Inside the Secret World of Opus Dei, Robert Hutchinson writes of the canonization of Opus Dei founder Josemaria Escriva, noting that in attendance was "Dr Carl A. Anderson, the Supreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus and senior American member of Opus Dei." Given the overlapping membership between Opus Dei and the KOC, the likelihood that the Penn State investigation was doomed by favoritism from the very beginning is very high indeed.

According to Vatican Insider, a project run by the daily newspaper La Stampa, Opus Dei is "one of the ecclesiastical bodies closest to the Pope". So the testimony of Jim Jenkins, former chair of the Archdiocese of San Francisco Review Board under Archbishop (now Cardinal) William Levada, should not be ignored. Jenkins states, in reference to the Dallas Charter which provided guidelines for how the Church would respond to the clerical abuse scandal, that "The Charter’s scope needed to be limited to the alleged assaults upon “minors” leaving the inappropriate sexual behavior of clerics with other adults beyond the jurisdiction of the review boards." In other words, the sexual assault of adults was considered to be acceptable behavior. Jenkins also states that "The behavior of bishops and cardinals was off-limits to the scope of any investigation by any archdiocesan review board." Translation: bishops and cardinals are not subject to civil law.

As Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the former Pope Benedict XVI was responsible for investigating clerical abuse scandals. Let's examine some of his accomplishments during that time period.

via CBS News:

The Vatican's lawyer says then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger told a California bishop to make sure a priest with a history of sexually molesting children didn't abuse while the church worked to defrock him...Attorney Jeffrey Lena was responding to a 1985 letter obtained by The Associated Press on Friday in which the future pope said more time was needed to study the case of the Rev. Stephen Kiesle. Lena says Ratzinger urged the bishop to give Kiesle "as much paternal care as possible." Lena says that was a way of saying the bishop was responsible for ensuring Kiesle didn't reoffend....The future Pope Benedict XVI resisted pleas to defrock Kiesle, citing concerns including "the good of the universal church," according to the 1985 letter bearing his signature. The correspondence, obtained by The Associated Press, is the strongest challenge yet to the Vatican's insistence that Benedict played no role in blocking the removal of pedophile priests during his years as head of the Catholic Church's doctrinal watchdog office. The letter, signed by then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, was typed in Latin and is part of years of correspondence between the Diocese of Oakland and the Vatican about the proposed defrocking of the Rev. Stephen Kiesle...

Attorney Irwin Zalkin represents a woman who says Kiesle assaulted her three times by the time she was 7 years old. Court documents accuse Kiesle of providing her with wine, binding her hands and sexually abusing her, Tracy reports....Earlier Friday, the Vatican confirmed that it was Ratzinger's signature on the letter. "The press office doesn't believe it is necessary to respond to every single document taken out of context regarding particular legal situations," the Rev. Federico Lombardi said....The diocese recommended removing Kiesle from the priesthood in 1981, the year Ratzinger was appointed to head the Vatican office that shared responsibility for disciplining abusive priests. The case then languished for four years at the Vatican before Ratzinger finally wrote to Oakland Bishop John Cummins. It was two more years before Kiesle was removed; during that time he continued to do volunteer work with children through the church..... the future pope also noted that any decision to defrock Kiesle must take into account the "good of the universal church" and the "detriment that granting the dispensation can provoke within the community of Christ's faithful, particularly considering the young age." Kiesle was 38 at the time.

Kiesle had been sentenced in 1978 to three years' probation after pleading no contest to misdemeanor charges of lewd conduct for tying up and molesting two young boys in a San Francisco Bay area church rectory. As his probation ended in 1981, Kiesle asked to leave the priesthood and the diocese submitted papers to Rome to defrock him. In his earliest letter to Ratzinger, Cummins warned that returning Kiesle to ministry would cause more of a scandal than stripping him of his priestly powers. "It is my conviction that there would be no scandal if this petition were granted and that as a matter of fact, given the nature of the case, there might be greater scandal to the community if Father Kiesle were allowed to return to the active ministry," Cummins wrote in 1982...California church officials wrote to Ratzinger at least three times to check on the status of Kiesle's case and Cummins discussed the case with officials during a Vatican visit, according to correspondence. At one point, a Vatican official wrote to say the file may have been lost and suggested resubmitting materials....As Kiesle's fate was being weighed in Rome, the priest returned to suburban Pinole to volunteer as a youth minister at St. Joseph Church, where he had served as associate pastor from 1972 to 1975.

Kiesle continued to volunteer with children, according to Maurine Behrend, who worked in the Oakland diocese's youth ministry office in the 1980s. After learning of his history, Behrend complained to church officials. When nothing was done she wrote a letter, which she showed to the AP. "Obviously nothing has been done after EIGHT months of repeated notifications," she wrote. "How are we supposed to have confidence in the system when nothing is done? A simple phone call to the pastor from the bishop is all it would take." She eventually confronted Cummins at a confirmation and Kiesle was gone a short time later, Behrend said. Kiesle, who married after leaving the priesthood, was arrested and charged in 2002 with 13 counts of child molestation from the 1970s. All but two were thrown out after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down as unconstitutional a California law extending the statute of limitations. He pleaded no contest in 2004 to a felony for molesting a young girl in his Truckee home in 1995 and was sentenced to six years in state prison.

Now would probably be a good time to include this painting by the highly talented tattoo artist Paul Booth:

*Research credit for many links in this post is due http://popecrimes.blogspot.com/2011/11/will-opus-dei-knights-shield-sandusky.html

Fury of Opus Dei in Latin America

Some of the word choices in this article seem a bit odd to me, but that might be due to problems of translation. I don't necessarily agree with all the opinions expressed here, aside from criticism of Opus Dei. FYI, some details that follow may be upsetting for sensitive readers.

via Pravda:

Lawyer Ives Gandra Martins da Silva, the principal exponent of the fascist sect Opus Dei in Brazil, is concerned about the advancement of the left in Latin America. In an angry article in the column Trends / Debates of Folha de Sao Paulo, he distilled hatred and prejudice against Hugo Chavez, Evo Morales, Fidel Castro and Lula... Besides lying about the reality of human rights in Cuba, he cannot hide his sympathy for the dictatorial regime of Chile, which has always had the active support of Opus Dei....The right-wing ideas and prejudices of Opus Dei are already known, but it is good not to underestimate the influence of this world sect - which enjoys space in the middle class media and has a strong presence in the state apparatus. Its interest in Latin America is not new and always hovers threateningly. Since its arrival to the continent, 50 years ago, Opus Dei cunningly plans its rise to power. The project only gained momentum with a wave of military coups in the region in the 60s. Its followers presided in several nations or advised numerous dictators. In the 90s, with the neo liberal avalanche, the faithful technocrats of this sect once again enjoy a certain prestige.

"Catechism" in Latin America

In the 50s, the sect seduced its first believers among the old oligarchies that sought to differentiate from indigenous peoples and preached religious fundamentalism. But Opus Dei only acquired greater strength with the wave of attacks from the 60s. Until then, its action was still dispersed. According to an excellent article by Marina Amaral in the magazine Dear Friends, "in 1970, Josemaría Escriva [founder of the sect in Spain] traveled to Mexico to start giving 'travel catechisms' of the Americas that lasted until the eve of his death in Rome in 1975."

In 1974, he visited South America, then dominated by dictatorships. "The progressive clergy tried to use the weight of the church to denounce torture and killings and to fight for the restoration of democracy. In his speeches, he once replied to a soldier that asked to follow the path of 'spiritual sanctification' of the Opus Dei: 'The soldier already has done half of the spiritual path." In this dark period, the sect supported the attacks and has participated in various dictatorial governments, according Emílio Corbière, author of the book "Opus Dei: Catholic totalitarianism.”

In Chile, the fascist sect of dictator Augusto Pinochet was what Augusto Franco was in Spain. The main ideologist of this bloodthirsty regime, Jaime Guzmá, was an active member of the sect, as well as hundreds of civilian and military boards. It also supported the strikes and participated in the authoritarian regimes in Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. According Corbière, it funded the regime of Nicaraguan dictator Anastácio Somoza until his defeat by the Sandinistas. In the decade of the 90s, it still gave "active assistance" to the terrorist and corrupt dictatorship of Alberto Fujimori, Peru.

Another "prosperous" phase occurs with the neo liberal offensive in the 90s. Boasting the sympathy of the pope and of autonomy facing the local churches, it benefited from the invasion of Spanish multinationals, the result of state-owned privatization. Many of them are influenced by cash from Opus Dei. According Henrique Magalhães, in article in the magazine The New Democracy, "Argentina handed their state telephone, oil, aviation and energy to Telefonica, Repsol, Endesa and Iberia. Iberia had already swallowed the LAN [aviation], of Chile, where the generation of energy was already controlled by Endesa. The Spanish banks also came to the continent in this process.”

"The Opus Dei is for the neo liberal model what the Dominicans and the Franciscans were to the cross and the Jesuits for the Lutheran Reform," compares José Steinsleger, columnist for the Mexican newspaper La Jornada. In the 90s, the sect also enlisted several bishops and cardinals in the region. The most famous was Juan Cipriani, of Peru, intimate friend of the dictator Alberto Fujimori. In 1997, during the invasion of the Japanese embassy by militants of the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement, the bishop earned the position of mediator and used a listening device in a crucifix, which enabled the police to invade the house and kill all its occupants.

In Brazil, the Opus Dei entrenched its root in 1957, in the city of Marília, inside Paulista, with the establishment of two centers. In 1961, given the importance of the branch, the sect visited the Spanish sect Xavier Ayala, the second in the hierarchy. "Doctor Xavier, as he liked to be called, although a priest, stepped foot on Brazilian soil with the mission of strengthening the conservative wing of the church. On the eve of the Second Vatican Council, the progressive clergy in Latin America argued for the revolutionary return to the origins of Christianity and the 'option for the poor', fundamentals of Liberation Theology," explains Marina Amaral.

The tentacles in Brazil

Still, according to the report, "the few, Opus Dei have been finding their allies on the university’s right. Among the first were two young promising youths: Ives Gandra and Carlos Alberto Di Franco, the first one sympathetic to monarchism and a defeated candidate for representative; the second, a secondary school student of the College Rio Branco, the Rotarians of Brazil. Ives began to attend the meetings of Opus Dei in 1963, Di Franco 'whistled' (asked to enter) in 1965. Today, the organization says it has in the country a little over three thousand members and about forty centers, where approximately six hundred sects live."

Growth in dictatorship

During the dictatorship, the sect also focused its action in the legal environment, which yields fruit until today. The retired promoter and ex-deputy Mr. Hélio Bicudo reveals two times being harassed by judges loyal to the organization. The exponent at this stage was José Rodrigues Geraldo Alckmin, appointed minister of the STF by dictator Garrastazu Medici in 1972, and uncle of the Tucanos (PSDB) candidate to the presidency in 2006. Until the 70's, however, the power of Opus Dei was embryonic. It had boards in important positions, but without coordinated action. Moreover, it was divided with the Tradition, Family and Property (TFP) the sympathies of Catholics of the extreme right-wing.

Its growth depended on the blessing of generals and links with powerful companies. Ives Gandra and Di Franco turned their "ambassadors", linking themselves with the owners of the media, right-wing politicians, bishops and entrepreneurs. College Catamarã (SP), Casa do Moinho (Cotia) and Publisher Quadrant - is from this phase of the construction of the structure of facade. It also created an NGO to raise funds: OSUC (Works Social, and Cultural University). It receives donations until today from Itaú, Bradesco, GM and Citigroup. Faced with this denunciation, Lizandro Carmona, OSUC, begged the journalist Marina Amaral: "For the love of God, do not go write that companies such as Itaú donate money to Opus Dei."

Recent Offensives in the region

In the recent phase, the Opus Dei set bold plans to win more political power in the region. In April 2002, it participated actively in the failed coup against President Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. One of its faithful, José Rodrigues Iturbe, became Minister of Foreign Affairs in the government of the elusive con man. The embassy of Spain, at the time governed by the Franco Popular Party (PP) of Jose Maria Aznar - whose wife is the Opus Dei - gave Guarita (Watchtower) to their faithful. Another con man linked to the sect, Gustavo Cisneiros, is the largest communications businessman in the country.

In December 2006, the sect witnessed the defeat of its candidate, Joaquim Laví, former adviser to the dictator Augusto Pinochet, for the presidency of Chile. Back in May 2006, it collected a new defeat with the candidacy of Lourdes Flores, nominee of the National Unity Party. In compensation, it celebrated the victory of narco terrorist Álvaro Uribe in Colombia, who dispersed millions of dollars from the government of George Bush. In Mexico, another known faithful of Opus Dei, Felipe Calderon, a former executive of Coca-Cola, won one of the most fraudulent elections in history of this country.

Its most daring move, though, was the attempt to elect a follower in Brazil. According to Henrique Magellan, "the hope of Opus Dei turned to Geraldo Alckmin, that today is one of its most prominent political structures. The Organization tried to make him president to form an axis with thegeopolitical leaders of Colombia and Mexico. " The media and the Tucanos (PSDB) members have even tried to cover up that shadowy connection. In a piece in the Folha de Sao Paulo, Alckmin pledged: "I am not one of the Opus Dei, who is in respect, but I do not know." He lied to hide his close relations with the fascist sect - from the time of childhood, in the meeting with his father and uncle-Minister of the dictatorship of the STF, to the illegal "talks of Morumbi." But the nation is not deceived. This explains the recent elitist moanings of Ives Gandra, high head of Opus Dei.

The above article does a great job of summarizing Opus Dei's connections to Latin American military dictatorships, but it doesn't get into some of the social policies the sect is actively promoting. For example, Opus Dei is known to have ties to Priests for Life, an anti-abortion organization which denies the medical reality that continuing a pregnancy can sometimes endanger the life of the mother. To get an idea of what a society governed by these principles would look like, consider the recent case in Brazil, where the mother of a 9-year-old, pregnant rape and incest victim was excommunicated by the Catholic church after arranging for her daughter to get an abortion. The doctors involved in the decision, who were also excommunicated, had warned her that her daughter was risking her life by continuing the pregnancy. Most reasonable people would let it go at that. The Vatican, however, insisted that, even though the child did not have the skeletal structure necessary for childbirth, she could still receive a Caesarian section.

This perspective demonstrates blatant and willful ignorance of the medical risks of pregnancy faced by young mothers. One of these risks includes preeclampsia, a condition of high blood pressure that can result in swelling of the face and hands, as well as permanent organ damage. Preeclampsia can also be a life-threatening condition. "Pro-life" organizers will argue that a few nine-year-old incest victims being forced to carry a rape baby to term despite their potential loss of life is a small price to pay for all the lives saved due to stringent anti-choice legislation. Let's examine that line of thinking more closely.

via The New York Times:

For proof that criminalizing abortion doesn't reduce abortion rates and only endangers the lives of women, consider Latin America. In most of the region, abortions are a crime, but the abortion rate is far higher than in Western Europe or the United States. Colombia - where abortion is illegal even if a woman's life is in danger - averages more than one abortion per woman over all of her fertile years. In Peru, the average is nearly two abortions per woman over the course of her reproductive years. In a region where there is little sex education and social taboos keep unmarried women from seeking contraception, criminalizing abortion has not made it rare, only dangerous. Rich women can go to private doctors. The rest rely on quacks or amateurs or do it themselves. Up to 5,000 women die each year from abortions in Latin America, and hundreds of thousands more are hospitalized.

Abortion is legal on demand in the region only in Cuba, and a few other countries permit it for extreme circumstances, mostly when the mother's life is at risk, the fetus will not live or the pregnancy is the result of rape. Even when pregnancies do qualify for legal abortions, women are often denied them because anti-abortion local medical officials and priests intervene, the requirements are unnecessarily stringent, or women do not want to incur the public shame of reporting rape.

But Latin Americans are beginning to look at abortion as an issue of maternal mortality, not just maternal morality. Where they have been conducted, polls show that Latin Americans support the right to abortion under some circumstances. Decriminalization, at least in part, is being seriously discussed in Colombia, Brazil, Venezuela, Uruguay and Argentina, and perhaps will be on the agenda after the presidential election in July in Mexico....Latin American women, who are increasing their participation in the work force and in politics, have also become more vocal. Their voice would be much louder were it not for the Bush administration's global gag rule, which bans any family planning group that gets American money from speaking about abortions, or even criticizing unsafe illegal abortions. This has silenced some respected and influential groups, such as Profamilia in Colombia. Anti-abortion lawmakers in Washington can look at Latin America as a place where the global gag rule has worked exactly as they had hoped. All Americans can look at Latin America to see unnecessary deaths and injuries from unsafe abortions.

Opus Dei lobbies to prevent maternal death exception for Irish abortion ban

via The Guardian:

The secret ultra-conservative Catholic sect Opus Dei is mobilising within the Irish professions to stop the republic reforming its abortion laws, one of the country's most prominent doctors has warned. John Crown, a leading cancer specialist and member of parliament, accused the powerful organisation of trying to exercise influence on the medical profession and politicians to prevent limited abortion being made legal for the first time in Ireland. The only physician on the parliamentary subcommittee exploring the abortion question at present, Crown said he believed Opus Dei was "a major player" in the campaign to thwart legislation that would allow for abortion when a mother's life was at risk.

The member of Ireland's second chamber, the Seanad, said he had received abuse over his role on the subcommittee, particularly when he revealed that 30 terminations had been carried out in Irish hospitals last year. The Fine Gael-Labour coalition is under intense pressure to introduce legislation that would allow for abortions when a woman's life is at risk, including from suicide. The momentum for change on abortion laws has intensified since the Indian dentist Savita Halappanavar died from blood poisoning after a Galway hospital refused to terminate her pregnancy last autumn.

Enda Kenny's government has promised reform but the taoiseach's Fine Gael party is coming under attack from anti-abortion activists, particularly in rural, conservative parts of the republic, who have threatened to picket the constituency offices of teachta dálas (members of the lower house of parliament, the Dáil Éirann) who previously promised to oppose any change in the law. Crown said: "I believe that many of the organisations that are most prominent in this campaign in trying to thwart reform will have substantial membership from Opus Dei." He said it was time for members of the Oireachtas (parliament) – both the Dáil and Seanad – to be required to declare if they belonged to any secret organisations, such as Opus Dei. "That is something that should be declared because there are potential conflicts of interest if one believes that one is answering to a higher authority than the parliament of the republic.

"We have several examples in history where leaders of this country asked if people should state their allegiance. Garret Fitzgerald [a former taoiseach] once famously asked his cabinet to inform him if they were members of secret organisations, which I think is not a bad idea at all for the whole of the Oireachtas."

Despite a highly organised, well-funded anti-abortion lobby, Crown told the Guardian he was confident both houses of parliament would pass legislation allowing abortion in limited circumstances. Such a move would finally enshrine in law the recommendations made by supreme court judges in the X case in 1992, when it was ruled that a 14-year-old rape victim had the right to a termination because of the risk to her life from suicide. Since then successive governments have failed to legislate in relation to the ruling. more...

The Catholic Right is run as a cryptocracy

via talk2action:

Bishop Robert Finn has many powerful friends on the Catholic Right. As a hard charging leader of what he has called "the church militant" and one of four American Opus Dei bishops, Finn is clearly one of their own. Nevertheless, it is extraordinary that his allies have chosen to side with an element in the institutional church obsessed with unquestioned authority and against Catholic children and their families. While Bill Donohue of the Catholic League is ubiquitous, he is not the only one rallying to defend Finn's handling of alleged child abuser Fr. Shawn Ratigan. It is time to throw open the shutters and allow some daylight into the shadows and dark corners of Catholic neoconservatism.

The Catholic League

While Bill Donohue and the Catholic League need no introduction, it is worth a quick review of their key members and advisers who share responsibility for the League's support for Finn.

Among the League's Board of Directors is Raymond Arroyo of Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN) who is reputed to be either an Opus Dei member or cooperator (but who in any case has certainly vigorously defended the controversial group). Also on the board is Candace de Russy, an Adjunct Fellow at the Hudson Institute, a neocon think tank that features Lewis "Scooter" Libby (of Valerie Plame fame) as a Senior Vice President. The League's Board of Advisers is populated by such leading neocons as Hadley Arkes, Mary Ann Glendon, Robert P. George, Michael Novak and George Weigel, who has sanitized past Vatican failures regarding pedophile clergy and recently declared his scorn for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP).

Thomas Monaghan

Another Catholic League adviser is Domino's Pizza magnate Tom Monaghan, who in many ways is the key to Donohue's activities in Kansas City-St. Joseph. Monaghan has, over the years, advanced the twin agendas of laissez-faire economics and ultra-orthodox Catholicism with money and political muscle. He has helped to fund Operation Rescue and Fr. Frank Pavone's Priests for Life as well as Legatus, the ultra-conservative millionaires-only club he founded. And according to Forbes, he has reportedly done the same for Opus Dei. Monaghan is also involved with another Finn defender, Opus Bono Sacerdotii.

Opus Bono Sacerdotii

The Kansas City Star recently reported that the Fr. Ratigan, the alleged pedophile priest, had received a psychiatric evaluation at Bishop Finn's behest. But there are questions about the psychiatrist's impartiality as well as his diagnosis. The Star pointed out:

Richard Fitzgibbons, who examined Ratigan in January after disturbing photographs of children were found on the priest's computer, is an adviser to Opus Bono Sacerdotii, according to the group's website. The nonprofit organization provides services to accused and imprisoned priests, including financial, legal and emotional support.

After his evaluation, Fitzgibbons told Finn that Ratigan was not a pedophile and that his pornography problem was a result of loneliness and depression, according to a report commissioned by the Kansas City-St. Joseph Diocese.

(Note that Fitzgibbons's diagnosis was "loneliness and depression" not pedophilia.)

Opus Bono Sacerdotii (OBS) describes, its mission:

Opus Bono Sacerdotii (Work for the Good of the Priesthood) was founded in response to many sensitive situations with priests requesting confidential assistance for unique problems. These situations may encompass a whole spectrum of circumstances, however, the success in caring for Catholic priests is understanding the uniqueness of each individual and their particular needs, abilities and desires especially as it effects the extraordinary relationship between the natural and supernatural aspect of the person of the priest.

BishopAccountability.org describes OBS co-founders Joseph Maher and Paul Barron as "members of Legatus." This is not unusual. Based in Monaghan's hometown of Detroit, Michigan, many of the key members of Legatus are also affiliated with the Monahan-founded or funded organizations, notably the ultra orthodox Ave Maria University ("AMU"), in Naples, Florida. These include such Catholic Right luminaries as the late neocon activist Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Fr. Thomas G. Guarino, and Fr. Michael Orsi. A stern-looking Donohue is pictured on the OBS homepage next to a link to his piece, "Straight Talk about the Catholic Church and SNAP Exposed." Fr. Orsi's past pronouncements about victims of priestly pedophilia have been controversial. For example, as a December 22, 2008 post at BishopAccountability.org noted:

Orsi's defense of sexually dysfunctional priests is rich with clericalism. This conclusion was highlighted in the book "Sacrilege: Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church". Leon Podles, a former federal investigator, is the book's author and, interestingly, a former supporter of AMU. In the chapter "Clerical Accomplices", Dr. Podles describes the pass that Orsi gives to guilty homosexual/pederast/pedophile priests as reflective of a time "in which members of society had unequal status before the law. Such inequality is always irritating, and is often used to protect privileged malefactors - and Orsi resents the loss of privilege."

Orsi uses his Ave Maria Chaplaincy to promote and defend OBS thanks to his two bosses, Ave Maria School of Law Chairman Tom Monaghan and President-Dean Bernard Dobranski. For all of the rants about liberal immorality, attacks on the family, and the "culture wars" penned by Monaghan and Dobranski in their fundraising letters, you'll never hear about the wink-and-nod given to Orsi or OBS in keeping pederasts at the altar.

That these Catholic Right leaders seem to want to save Finn's position as bishop at almost any cost, suggests that their goals for the Church as a bastion of religious and political authoritarianism, takes precedence over everything else -- including the safety and well being of children.


Also related, via Slate, is this article about how the Catholic Church manages to avoid financial disclosure rules that secular organizations are bound to. This information is crucial in understanding how groups such as Opus Bono Sacerdotii have at times been able to utilize the Church's wealth and bureaucratic exemptions to circumvent civil law, a privilege that is obviously unavailable to the rest of the world, despite the group's attempt to portray priests accused of pedophilia as a persecuted minority.

How Rich Is the Catholic Church?

Pope Francis is not just the spiritual leader of one of the world’s major religions: He’s also the head of what’s probably the wealthiest institution in the entire world. The Catholic Church’s global spending matches the annual revenues of the planet’s largest firms, and its assets—huge amounts of real estate, St. Patrick's Cathedral, Vatican City, some of the world’s greatest art—surely exceed those of any corporation by an order of magnitude. But it turns out to be surprisingly difficult to understand exactly how rich the church is. That’s in part because church finances are complicated. But it’s also because, in the United States at least, churches in general are exempted from the financial reporting and disclosure requirements that otherwise apply to nonprofit groups. And it turns out, that exemption may have undesirable consequences.

The main thing we know about Catholic Church finance is that in cash flow terms, the United States is by far the most important branch. America is a rich country with a large population of Catholics. What’s more, America’s Catholic population is a religious minority. That’s meant that, rather than using political clout to influence the shape of mainstream government institutions, as in an overwhelmingly Catholic country such as Brazil, the Catholic Church in the United States has created a parallel state: a vast web of schools, hospitals, universities, and charities that serve millions of clients.

Our best window into the overall financial picture of American Catholicism comes from a 2012 investigation by the Economist, which offered a rough-and-ready estimate of $170 billion in annual spending, of which almost $150 billion is associated with church-affiliated hospitals and institutions of higher education. The operating budget for ordinary parishes, at around $11 billion a year, is a relatively small share, and Catholic Charities is a smaller share still. Apple and General Motors, by way of comparison, each had revenue of about $150 billion worldwide in Fiscal Year 2012. Legally speaking, there is no such thing as “the Catholic Church,” which is why these finances get so complicated. As far as the law is concerned, each diocese is a separate legal entity, incorporated in the states where it operates. Generally speaking, they are organized as what’s known as a corporation sole—a legal corporation wholly controlled by the individual bishop rather than a board of directors—and not officially part of any larger transnational spiritual organization. This has led to conflicts during the sex abuse scandals. Lawsuits have caused disputes about how deep the church’s pockets go and who should pay.

On several occasions, abuse-related litigation has inspired dioceses to declare bankruptcy, which offers a rare window into the internal financial organization of the institution. Individual parishes, though operating under the umbrella of the relevant bishop, have a fair degree of financial autonomy. They conduct separate fundraising and maintain separate expenses. That way, parish donors can feel they’re bolstering their particular community and not an impersonal bureaucracy. But it’s common for parish investment funds within a single diocese to be pooled. When a diocese declares bankruptcy, this raises the question of whether pooled parish investment funds are available to be seized by the bishop’s creditors or whether they exist separately.

As a fascinating article in this month’s American Bankruptcy Institute Journal explains, the status of parish investment funds depends on some very subtle details. Both the Diocese of Milwaukee and the Diocese of Wilmington ran pooled investment funds in which a single account simply noted how much each parish had contributed. The difference is that in Wilmington, Del., operating funds were also mingled into the pooled account, whereas in Milwaukee they were kept separate. That small difference ended up costing Wilmington parishes $74 million in exposure to Episcopal creditors. At the same time, as a matter of Canon Law individual parishes can be wholly “suppressed,” merged into other parishes, or otherwise divided up, essentially at the discretion of the bishop—notwithstanding the existence of separate bank accounts. This authority suggests that the diocese does indeed wholly own and control its parishes, but church officials take advantage of the ambiguity, sometimes claiming to fully control its parishes, sometimes—for legal reasons—arguing that the parishes are wholly independent entities.

Given America’s diverse religious landscape, the Catholic Church is hardly unique in taking advantage of the First Amendment to engage in some opaque accounting. It’s simply the largest player in this game. Lawrence Wright’s recent Scientology exposé, Going Clear, reveals egregious exploitation of religious privileges for the personal financial benefit of church leaders. Or consider the case of the Tennessee pastor arrested on money laundering and drug charges only because a local TV news investigation revealed that he was using donations to pay off what amounted to personal debts.

The legal framework that allows for this funny business has been constructed in the name of religious freedom but hardly seems required by that important principle. America has a robust ecology of secular nonprofit groups that manage to abide by fairly stringent accounting and disclosure standards. These help donors know where their money is going and reassure residual claimants that there’s some consistent theory of whose assets are whose. Religion is big business—the Catholic Church the biggest of all—and it deserves to be treated as such in the relevant ways.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue protected convicted child molester Rev. Shawn Ratigan

It probably doesn't hurt to mention that Bill Donohue has served as a spokesman for Opus Dei. Additionally, the Catholic League was founded by Jesuit priest Virgil Bloom, and its logo is bisected by a sword, just the same as the Jesuit logo is. The convicted child molester discussed in this case has also been defended by another Opus Dei spokesperson, Catholic priest John Zuhlsdorf. But I'm sure that's all a rather large coincidence and secretive Catholic fraternal orders have nothing whatsoever to do with the organized cover-up of child abuse. FYI, this article contains some extremely disturbing details about child sexual abuse that might be upsetting for sensitive readers.

via Counseling in Chicago:

Examining the religious right wing activism defending Catholic clergy sex abusers and the response of the church, it’s pretty easy to understand why Joe Paterno didn’t do anything to protect the children being raped by Jerry Sandusky. He’s Joe Paterno and probably feels entitled to do whatever he wants, just like Bill Donohue, Bishop Finn of Kansas City, the Catholic Pope, and the entire Catholic church hierarchy. Bill Donohue, Executive Director of Catholic League Center for Religious and Civil Rights, wrote a post on November 11, 2011 attacking a Kansas City Newspaper for spreading lies about Rev. Shawn Ratigan, a Catholic priest in Kansas City indicted for possession of child pornography.

The indictment of Rev. Shawn Ratigan referenced in the Kansas City newspaper, states:

“U.S. Attorney Beth Phillips said Tuesday that a federal grand jury indicted Rev. Shawn Ratigan on 13 counts, including six counts of producing child pornography. According to the indictment, Ratigan sexually exploited five victims, ranging from age 2 to 12, over a six year period of time.”

Ratigan’s case, and Donohue’s defense of him shows how the Catholic church routinely hides behind others to hide their abject and almost total disregard for the safety and protection of children from Catholic clergy sex predators. The evidence supporting Ratigan indictment are substantial. Here is a summary:

In May of 2010, a letter from St. Patrick’s grade school filed a formal letter of complaint about inappropriate behavior by Ratigan, lack of boundaries, and an incident observed by parents and teachers where he directed a fourth grade girl to sit on his lap and lean her back against him for at least 5 minutes until parents went up to him and alerted him he was being watched.

This letter further expressed the very serious concern that Ratigan had upset many teachers and parents by his behavior who believed he had many of the characteristics of a pedophile.

Read the entire letter here.

On December 16, 2010, Ratigan took his personal laptop to a computer technician for repair.

The computer technician found several graphic images of girls under the age of 12 with the focus of the picture on their vaginas.

The technician reported the images to the Kansas City diocese where Ratigan was assigned.

On December 17, 2010, Ratigan attempted suicide and was hospitalized

The Kansas City diocese made a copy of the graphic images on Ratigan’s laptop, then gave the laptop to Ratigan’s family.

Ratigan’s family destroyed the computer.

Then, five months later, law enforcement authorities were notified about Ratigan’s possession of child pornography.

May 13, 2011, the disk containing the graphic images of children was given to the police.

May 19, 2011, Ratigan was arrested for possession of child pornography.
The police probable cause form states that Ratigan possessed a CD with 14 different images of child pornography of a 3-4 year old female identified as “SN.”

Police investigated Ratigan’s church desktop and found many of the same and additional graphic images of children. Many of the minor females were identified and were being interviewed.

October 14, 2011, the Kansas City Star reported that Bishop Finn and the diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph were being indicted on the misdemeanor charge of failure to report child abuse.

Please read the Star’s reporting of this charge:

“(Bishop) Finn and the diocese had reasonable cause to believe that Ratigan may have abused a child but did not report it to authorities between Dec. 16, 2010, and May 11, 2011, the indictment alleged. Evidence of that concern, the indictment said, was previous suspicions about Ratigan’s behavior around children and the discovery in December 2010 of hundreds of photos of children on Ratigan’s laptop.

Those photos included images of a child’s naked vagina and upskirt pictures focusing on the child’s crotch.

Finn and the diocese also must have had concerns about Ratigan’s conduct because they had restricted him from being around children after the laptop images were discovered, according to the charges.

A diocesan official reported Ratigan to police on May 11.”

The prosecutor’s in this case indicted Bishop Finn and the catholic diocese after several months of reviewing the evidence, including the school principal’s formal complaint from May 2010 and Ratigan’s explicit images of children.

While this seems like a lot of evidence, Bill Donohue has been leading the defense of Ratigan, Finn, and the catholic diocese with this false and distorted post which I include in it’s entirety:

“KANSAS CITY STAR LIES AGAIN”
“The Star continued with its lies against the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph with a column by Barbara Shelly. Regarding the behavior of Fr. Shawn Ratigan, she writes of “hundreds of explicit images of children” found on the priest’s laptop last year. What she didn’t say is that none of the photos were pornographic. And while a police officer and an attorney were called immediately (the pictures were disturbing), no formal complaint with the authorities was made. That’s because no one calls the police about something that is not criminal. The Kansas City Star disturbs me. Should I call 911?

Shelly then says, “Not until five months later, when more disturbing images turned up, did officials alert the police.” Wrong again: no new photos triggered anything. What happened is that the cops were called even though there was no complainant and no crime had been committed; they were called because Ratigan violated an internal diocesan stricture limiting his movement. Had the Diocese acted like other institutions, no one would even know about this issue (it would have been handled internally the way the Star handles matters that are unethical, but not criminal).

Shelly is also wrong to say that this case involves child abuse: no, it involves the possibility that someone may have been abused. If Shelly were right, she would be able to identify the victim. She can’t. Shelly is also wrong to make reference to Ratigan as a pedophile. In fact, he was officially diagnosed as suffering from depression, and was explicitly deemed not to be a pedophile. Moreover, most of the acts committed by miscreant priests were homosexual in nature, so once again Shelly fails to tell the truth. The lies just keep on coming, and we will correct every one of them.

Bill Donohue doesn’t just try to “spin” the story in a more positive light. He changes the facts to fit his argument that Ratigan, Finn, the diocese, and catholics in general are getting a bad deal. I have highlighted claims he makes above which are completely false. When Donohue calls the Star and Shelly liars, he is using a common defense of bully narcissists…projection. Blame others for what you are doing yourself.
Donohue is using the strategy of most narcissists who want everyone to see the world their way....The world will never see the end to the sexual abuse of children. We can only hope for more responsible adults to take action immediately to intervene and protect children who may be at risk or already being abused as in the Penn State and Kansas City cases so sadly illustrate.

Opus Dei Bishop charged with failure to report child pornography

via The Daily Kos:

Father Shawn Ratigan of the diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, led by Bishop Robert Finn, has pleaded guilty in Federal Court to four counts of producing child pornography and one count of attempted production of child pornography. Both Ratigan's and Bishop Finn's defenses (Finn is charged with failing to report it) had become a rallying point for some in the Catholic Right, particularly those having intersecting activity in Opus Dei, the Bill Donohue-led Catholic League and neoconservatism. They further used the incident to try to destroy the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP). But now that Ratigan has confessed to his pedophilia-related crimes -- what do these reactionaries who imagine themselves as defenders of the faith have to say for themselves?

The trial date for Bishop Finn has been set for September 24, 2012. As I reported here and here, Bishop Finn, previously best known for his Opus Dei vision for the Church and society, had constructive knowledge of improper touching of young girls and possession of child pornography by Ratigan. Ratigan's defense was eventually taken over by Opus Bono Sacerdotii (OBS), a Michigan-based organization funded by Domino's Pizza chain founder Tom Monaghan. OBS sees its mission as defending priests from allegations of sexual abuse. OBS had Ratigan examined by a staff psychiatrist who determined that Ratigan was not a pedophile but suffering from "loneliness and depression."

That questionable diagnosis has been superceded by Ratigan's August 2, 2012 confession and guilty pleas in Federal Court. As The Kansas City Star reported:

Thursday afternoon, the Rev. Shawn Ratigan stood in the very public forum of a federal courtroom and confessed to some of his own.

Ratigan, 46, pleaded guilty to using five girls to produce or attempt to produce child pornography over several years while serving as pastor to congregations in the Northland and St. Joseph.

As well as:

Each count carries a maximum sentence of up to 30 years in federal prison.

"When a defendant who wears a religious collar, who has the trust of the community, engages in conduct of this nature, his crimes are more devastating and more reprehensible," said David M. Ketchmark, acting U.S. attorney for the Western District of Missouri. "With today's guilty pleas ... there's an assurance that he will face stiff mandatory penalties and that he won't have an opportunity to harm another child."

Ketchmark said prosecutors will recommend what he termed "a virtual life sentence."

This brings us back to Bill Donohue of the Catholic League who has distinguished himself by attacking Ratigan's victims; the The Kansas City Star for covering the crimes and the cover-up; and SNAP and their attorneys for advocating for the victims. Earlier in the year he staged a number of events in Kansas City at which he denounced anyone who dared to question Bishop Finn's actions in the matter. So far, the response of Donahue, and (as far as I know) the other reactionaries mentioned above, has been absolute silence. A quick view of the Catholic League's web page containing the organization's most recent press releases has nary a cyber peep about Kansas City, including one statement on child abuse. What then do we hear in the silence of the Church and its archest defenders? For at least this Catholic it confirms my initial belief that the actions of Donohue, his organization, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, and all those who coalesced around Bishop Finn, that their actions on Kansas City had nothing to do with the well-being of everyday Catholics and everything to do with keeping the hierarchy free from accountability.

Bishop Finn has many powerful friends on the Catholic Right. As a hard charging leader of what he has called "the church militant" and one of four American Opus Dei bishops, Finn is clearly one of their own. The fact that these activists want to save Finn's position as bishop at almost any cost, suggests that their goals for the Church as a bastion of religious and political authoritarianism takes precedence over everything else -- including the safety and well being of children. Silence might be a legitimate legal consideration for some in light of Finn's pending trial. But it soon will be time for Donohue and his cohorts to announce their penance. They could begin by apologizing to Ratigan's victims; explaining how they could have been so wrong; telling us how they intend to mend their ways; and making some kind of restitution not only to the victims of children in the care of the Church, but to all those whom they have subjected to calumny.

Opus Dei and right wing dictatorships

Since yesterday's posts there have been several incoming search phrases regarding Opus Dei so here is some basic information on the organization's support for right wing dictatorships, via the Opus Dei wikipedia page. Bracketed quotes are my own commentary.

Opus Dei was founded in 1928 by an Aragonese Roman Catholic priest, Josemaria Escriva, and it was subsequently recognized by the Roman Catholic Church as its first secular religious institution...Members make a commitment to dedicate their professional talents to the service of God and to seek to win converts through their missionary zeal. The organization in Spain and everywhere else has emphasized professional excellence, whether they are farmers or teachers, and it has expected its members who have talents for politics to serve in government positions, in accord, it says, with the Social Doctrine of the Church...Many newly published Spanish history textbooks agree that the Opus Dei had a strong influence in the Franco regime. Moreover, Opus Dei developed itself in its early days during the Franco regime. According to these books, Opus Dei was not only linked but also tightly interwoven with the power structures of the Francoist authoritarian government soon after the Spanish Civil War, although its stronger involvement in the government came only in the late 1950s. It had at least 8 ministers during Franco's rule. This was in keeping with the organization's aim of influencing the development of society indirectly....Because of what some critics see as clannishness and secrecy surrounding the organization, they termed it the "Holy Mafia."

Also, here is an excerpt from an excellent article on neofascism within the Catholic Church, via the Daily Kos:


What we are seeing today in the fight over birth control is a revival of a very old, and very dangerous kind of Catholicism. It is not one supported or practiced by most Rank and File Catholics. It is a kind of Catholicism which has done irreparable harm. It is a kind of Catholicism unfit for existence in the modern world. It was the underpinning of the regimes of Mussolini in Italy, The National Catholicism of Francisco Franco, in Spain; The Parti Rexiste in Belgium; The Irish Blueshirts; The Croatian Ustaše, the Nazi puppet government in Croatia, and ultimately, was the kind of Catholicism practiced by the Sainted Josemaría Escrivá, founder of the Catholic order Opus Dei.

That's where the story begins and ends: Opus Dei.

Spain, The Founding of Opus Dei

Josemaría Escrivá is the best place to start. He was a catholic priest during the Second Spanish Republic, who developed a kind of Catholicism in the late 1920's which Fascists found very attractive. He rose to prominence and political influence during Franco's spain. His book describing Opus Dei was first published with an introduction by a Pro-Franco bishop, which contained many statements in support of National Catholicism. Saint Escriva personally preached to Franco during a week-long prayer retreat at Franco's Palace. Saint Escriva has been accused by catholic priests who knew him of Holocaust Denial, and many recall statements by Escriva defending Hitler. Saint Escriva has said that Hitler couldn't have killed 6 million Jews, and that "Hitler against the Jews" really meant "Hitler against communism."

He famously wrote a letter to Franco in the 1950's saying

Although a stranger to any political activity, I cannot help but rejoice as a priest and Spaniard that the Chief of State’s authoritative voice should proclaim that, “The Spanish nation considers it a badge of honor to accept the law of God according to the one and true doctrine of the Holy Catholic Church, inseparable faith of the national conscience which will inspire its legislation.” It is in fidelity to our people’s Catholic tradition that the best guarantee of success in acts of government, the certainty of a just and lasting peace within the national community, as well as the divine blessing for those holding positions of authority, will always be found. I ask God our Lord to bestow upon your Excellency with every sort felicity and impart abundant grace to carry out the grave mission entrusted to you.

None of this is to say that all Catholics supported Franco. Plenty of Catholic bishops and priests opposed him, including bishop Mateo Múgica, and Cardinal Francisco Vidal Y Barraquer. I would also like to point out that neither Vidal Y Barraquer or Mateo Mugica were sainted. They are relatively forgotten. Múgica doesn't even have a Wikipedia page in English. You'll notice that this will become a recurring theme in our history of Opus Dei and Catholicism in Fascist Europe. Those who stood against the tide end up forgotten, while those that supported the brutal regimes end up sainted.

And so courageous men that fought a military dictatorship and died in exile are forgotten while Escriva is the sainted founder of Opus Dei. Racist. Fascist. Holocaust Denier. Despite the fact that we know about his writings, his views, his pretension to political power, and his support of Franco, all of these facts surrounding the man have been referred to as "Black Myths." Catholic authorities deny that any of this happened, and call anyone who dares point out indisputable facts "anti-catholic." Just like those laws about birth control.

Here is some additional information on Francisco Franco's regime, again via wikipedia:

Francisco Franco y Bahamonde (Spanish: [fɾanˈθisko ˈfɾaŋko]; 4 December 1892 – 20 November 1975), was a Spanish general, the leader of the Nationalist military rebellion during the Spanish Civil War, and the authoritarian head of state of Spain from 1939 to his death in November 1975....After winning the civil war with military aid from Italy and Germany as exemplified in the Bombing of Guernica — while the Soviet Union and various Internationalists aided the Republicans —, he dissolved the Spanish Parliament. He then established a right-wing dictatorship and was de facto regent of the nominally restored Kingdom of Spain, that lasted until 1978, when a new constitution was drafted....he supported the volunteer Blue Division that fought with the Axis on the Eastern Front, and until 1943 the German navy used Spanish harbours....

...After the end of World War II, Franco maintained his control in Spain through the implementation of austere measures: the systematic suppression of dissident views through censorship and coercion,[4][5] the imprisonment of ideologically opposed enemies in concentration camps (1936–1947) throughout the country (such as Los Merinales in Seville, San Marcos in León, Castuera in Extremadura, and Miranda de Ebro),[6] the implementation of forced labor in prisons,[7] and the use of the death penalty and heavy prison sentences as deterrents for his ideological enemies....The first decade of Franco's rule in the 1940s following the end of the Civil War in 1939 saw continued oppression and the killing of an undetermined number of political opponents. Estimation is difficult and controversial, but the number of people killed probably lies somewhere between 15,000 and 50,000 (see above, The end of the Civil War)...Franco's Spanish nationalism promoted a unitary national identity by repressing Spain's cultural diversity. Bullfighting and flamenco[62] were promoted as national traditions while those traditions not considered "Spanish" were suppressed... All cultural activities were subject to censorship, and many, such as the Sardana, the national dance of Catalunya, were plainly forbidden...

...On the other hand, the Catholic Church was upheld as the established church of the Spanish State, and regained many of the traditional privileges it had lost under the Republic. Civil servants had to be Catholic, and some official jobs even required a "good behavior" statement by a priest. Civil marriages which had taken place under Republican Spain were declared null and void unless confirmed by the Catholic Church. Divorce was forbidden, and also contraceptives and abortion....The enforcement by public authorities of traditional Catholic values was a stated intent of the regime, mainly by using a law (the Ley de Vagos y Maleantes, Vagrancy Act) enacted by Azaña.[63] The remaining nomads of Spain (Gitanos and Mercheros like El Lute) were especially affected. In 1954, homosexuality, pedophilia, and prostitution were, through this law, made criminal offenses,[64]...

Status of women

Francoism professed a devotion to the traditional role of women in society, that is: loving child to her parents and brothers, faithful to her husband, residing with her family. Official propaganda confined her role to family care and motherhood. Immediately after the war, most progressive laws passed by the Republic aimed at equality between the sexes were made void. Women could not become judges, or testify in trial. They could not become university professors. Their affairs and economy had to be managed by their father or by their husbands. Even in the 1970s a woman fleeing from an abusive husband could be arrested and imprisoned for "abandoning the home" (abandono del hogar). Until the 1970s a woman could not have a bank account without a co-sign by her father or husband.[65][These policies would have been in keeping with Church doctrine, since Pope Pius XI was opposed to women having the right to vote.]

Update: Opus Dei involved in Roman Catholic child trafficking network*

The recent scandal in Spain involving the theft and subsequent trafficking of hundreds of babies by the Spanish Roman Catholic Church has been revealed to be linked to an adoption agency run by the secret society Opus Dei. Children were typically taken from single mothers who were sometimes threatened with exposure as adulterers if they exposed the crimes of the Church. Here is an excerpt from a news article followed by brief commentary, via El Pais. Skeptical readers can verify the involvement of Opus Dei here as well.

On the trail of Spain's stolen children

In the decade following the end of the Spanish Civil War, an unholy alliance of doctors, priests, and General Francisco Franco's secret police systematically took thousands of children from vulnerable women known to have supported the Republican cause. These women were often in prison, or their husbands had been killed or were also in jail. It was seen at the time as an effective way of inflicting a lasting punishment on those who had backed the wrong side in the war, at the same time as preventing the appearance of a new generation of "reds" by placing the children in the care of families who supported the new regime.

But over recent years, it has emerged that the practice continued beyond the war, which came to an end in 1939, and was widespread throughout the Franco era - even after the dictator died in 1975. A network of Catholic Church-run children's homes and private hospitals would take newborn infants, typically from young, impoverished single mothers, who were told that their baby had died. Estimates put the total number of children who may have been illegally adopted between 1950 and 1980 at around 300,000.

...The link that enabled the practice of taking children from their mothers - now through deception rather than by force - up to and beyond the death of Franco, was made up of a network of priests and nuns, as well as Catholic doctors, judges and notaries, many of them belonging to the highly secretive Opus Dei movement.more...

What is highly interesting here is that it reveals the extent to which Opus Dei has been involved in supporting right wing dictatorships, a history the group has repeatedly attempted to minimize, despite the fact that, in 1958, Josemaria Escriva, Opus Dei's founder, wrote a letter to General Franco announcing his congratulations and support for the regime. Not mentioned in the above article is Opus Dei's practice of recruiting members through highly developed techniques of cult mind control. Here is an excerpt from a personal testimony on the Opus Dei Awareness Network website:

"While many Catholic religious organizations now question whether corporal mortification brings a person closer to God, the lay organization Opus Dei embraces corporal mortification in their program of making modern-day martyrs. The use of the cilice (see photo), a barbed-wire chain worn around the groin for two hours each day and the disciplines (see photo), a flagellation device, is well-documented by former numerary (celibate) members. And Opus Dei’s 1950 Constitutions, whose operational and governing paragraphs are still in effect say:

“They conserve faithfully the pious custom of chastisement of the body to keep it in a state of servitude, by wearing a small cilice for at least two hours a day, taking the discipline and sleeping on the floor once a week, making adequate provision to safeguard the health.”...I found out to what extreme this philosophy is carried out when I began to have doubts about my numerary vocation after living in an Opus Dei center for two years. They assigned me a new spiritual director to get me back on track with my life-long commitment to the organization. She was the same age as me, 24. She took me on pilgrimages, and I explained to her that I wanted to leave because I wanted to get married some day. She laughed and told me that the lives of the supernumeraries were far worse and that “men are jerks in pants.” In addition to spending more time with me than our usual weekly fraternal chat, she assigned me the following spiritual reading:..The secret internal document in which Fr. Alvaro del Portillo describes an incident which happened while he and Escriva were hiding in the Madrid’s Honduran consulate in 1937 during the Spanish Civil War. This testimony is recounted in Andrea Tornielli’s book on Escriva and is translated by John Allen of the National Catholic Reporter, ““Escriva would ask for the use of the bedroom alone when it was time for his spiritual practices. Once, however, his chief aide, Fr. Alvaro del Portillo (who would later succeed Escriva as head of Opus Dei), was sick and could not leave the room. Escriva thus told Portillo to cover his head with his blanket. Portillo described what followed: ‘Soon I began to hear the forceful blows of his discipline. I will never forget the number: there were more than a thousand terrible blows, precisely timed, and always inflicted with the same force and the same rhythm. The floor was covered with blood, but he cleaned it up before the others came in.’” more...

It is also interesting that, when most people discuss covert rule by secret societies, the focus is on the "secular humanism" of the Illuminati, with scant mention of the cult's origins in rituals of the Jesuits, a Catholic secret society whose founder also belonged to a secret society named Alumbrados(Illuminated). The Illuminati's founder, Adam Weishaupt, was himself a Jesuit and he based the rituals of the Illuminati upon those of the Jesuits. Ultimately, both right wing religious ideologies and their supposed left wing counterpart in libertinism are rooted in Gnostic sects of antiquity, and both sides have repeatedly been linked to gross abuses of power, whether through politics, industry, religion or the media. Since geopolitical centralization is by no means partisan in nature, it is vital to dig deeper to understand the philosophical undercurrent which unifies the seeming opposites in dictatorial criminal rule. For now, I will wrap things up by comparing images of the pagan sun cross with the insignia of Opus Dei and the Jesuits, an organization that has repeatedly been linked to assassinations(notice what appears to be the image of a sword in their logo. It's the first one down). The Knights of Malta, yet another Catholic secret society linked to right wing dictatorships, will have to wait for another day.




*Credit is due my East Bay reader for inspiration for this post. ;)

Opus Dei member argued for total abortion ban in El Salvador

I recently came across this NYTimes article about abortion in El Salvador, which is a unique country, legally speaking, because not only are total bans on abortion in place, even including when the life of the mother is in jeopardy, the ban is enforced by police and medical spies. Predictably, since the law was passed the maternal death rate has since reached a high of 1 in 350. This is probably a good time, yet again, to post a link about Queen Anne's Lace, an herbal implantation inhibitor that can cause a fertilized egg to leave the body painlessly, typically within 72 hours after conception. Again, this may be a bit of a tangent but I thought it was somewhat relevant

since it highlights the moral bankruptcy of covert organizations like Opus Dei, which was involved in enforcing the ban. Here are some choice quotes from the article.





The pope's appointment of Lacalle 11 years ago brought to the Archdiocese of San Salvador a different kind of religious leader. Lacalle, an outspoken member of the conservative Catholic group Opus Dei, redirected the country's church politics. Lacalle's predecessors were just as firmly opposed to abortion as he was. What he brought to the country's anti-abortion movement was a new determination to turn that opposition into state legislation and a belief that the church should play a public role in the process. In 1997, conservative legislators in the Assembly introduced a bill that would ban abortion in all circumstances. The archbishop campaigned actively for its passage.



There are other countries in the world that, like El Salvador, completely ban abortion, including Malta, Chile and Colombia. El Salvador, however, has not only a total ban on abortion but also an active law-enforcement apparatus — the police, investigators, medical spies, forensic vagina inspectors and a special division of the prosecutor's office responsible for Crimes Against Minors and Women, a unit charged with capturing, trying and incarcerating an unusual kind of criminal.



Julia Regina de Cardenal runs the Yes to Life Foundation in San Salvador, which provides prenatal care and job training to poor pregnant women. She was a key advocate for the passage of the ban. She argued that the existing law's exception for the life of the mother was outdated. As she explained to me, "There does not exist any case in which the life of the mother would be in danger, because technology has advanced so far."...In January 1999, as the issue headed toward the second vote in the Assembly, Pope John Paul II visited Latin America. "The church must proclaim the Gospel of life and speak out with prophetic force against the culture of death," he declared in Mexico City."May the continent of hope also be the continent of life!"..."At the hospital they asked me what I had. I didn't want to say. I said I felt bad. They did tests on my urine, blood and lungs and found I had a severe respiratory infection. They did an ultrasound and found my kidneys, lung and liver were infected. And the ultrasound showed something else. They asked me: "Why do you have a perforated uterus? What have you done?" Then they did a vaginal exam, and it was the most painful thing for me in the world. They put something in me, and I cried out. They had two doctors holding me down. They said they knew I had had an abortion because my uterus was perforated and big and they would have to operate immediately. All I remember was going to the operating room, and then I don't remember anything because for the next six days I was in a coma"...



"Back-alley abortion" is a term that has long been part of the abortion debate. In the United States, in the years since Roe v. Wade, it has come to seem metaphorical, perhaps even hyperbolic, but it happens to conjure precisely D.C.'s experience. And it's easy in El Salvador to find plenty of evidence that D.C.'s story is neither isolated nor the worst case. A report by the Center for Reproductive Rights offers this grim list of tools used in clandestine abortions: "clothes hangers, iron bars, high doses of contraceptives, fertilizers, gastritis remedies, soapy water and caustic agents (such as car battery acid)."...when a woman might face jail time for an abortion, she's less likely to discuss her pregnancy at all. According to a study on attempted suicide and teen pregnancy published last year by academics at the University of El Salvador, some girls who poison their wombs with agricultural pesticide (its efficacy being a Salvadoran urban legend) would rather report the cause of their resulting hospital visit as "attempted suicide," which is not as felonious a crime nor as socially unbearable as abortion. "They don't want to be interviewed about abortion," Irma Elizabeth Asencio, one of the study's authors, explained to me. "They know they have committed a crime."...



Abortion as it exists in El Salvador today tends to operate on three levels. The well-off retain the "right to choose" that comes of simply having money. They can fly to Miami for an abortion, or visit the private office of a discreet and well-compensated doctor. Among the very poor, you can still find the back-alley world described by D.C. and the others who turn up in hospitals with damaged or lacerated wombs..."When we get a call from a hospital reporting an abortion," said Flor Evelyn Tópez, "the first thing we do is make sure the girl gets into custody. So if there is not a police officer there, we call the police and begin to collect evidence." Tópez is a prosecutor in the district of Apopa in San Salvador...Wandee Mira, an obstetrician at a hospital in San Salvador, told me that she had seen "a young girl handcuffed to her hospital bed with a police officer standing outside the door." "Yes, we sometimes call doctors from the Forensic Institute to do a pelvic exam," Tópez said, referring to the nation's main forensic lab, "and we ask them to document lacerations or any evidence such as cuts or a perforated uterus." In other words, if the suspicions of the patient's doctor are not conclusive enough, then in that initial 72-hour period, a forensic doctor can legally conduct a separate search of the crime scene. Tópez said, however, that vaginal searches can take place only with "a judge's permission."...Doctors in El Salvador now understand that it is their legal duty to report any woman suspected of having had an abortion.



A policy that criminalizes all abortions has a flip side. It appears to mandate that the full force of the medical team must tend toward saving the fetus under any circumstances. This notion can lead to some dangerous practices. Consider an ectopic pregnancy, a condition that occurs when a microscopic fertilized egg moves down the fallopian tube — which is no bigger around than a pencil — and gets stuck there (or sometimes in the abdomen). Unattended, the stuck fetus grows until the organ containing it ruptures. A simple operation can remove the fetus before the organ bursts. After a rupture, though, the situation can turn into a medical emergency.



According to Sara Valdés, the director of the Hospital de Maternidad, women coming to her hospital with ectopic pregnancies cannot be operated on until fetal death or a rupture of the fallopian tube. "That is our policy," Valdés told me. She was plainly in torment about the subject. "That is the law," she said. "The D.A.'s office told us that this was the law." Valdés estimated that her hospital treated more than a hundred ectopic pregnancies each year. She described the hospital's practice. "Once we determine that they have an ectopic pregnancy, we make sure they stay in the hospital," she said. The women are sent to the dispensary, where they receive a daily ultrasound to check the fetus. "If it's dead, we can operate," she said. "Before that, we can't." If there is a persistent fetal heartbeat, then they have to wait for the fallopian tube to rupture....



One doctor, who asked to remain anonymous because of the risk of prosecution, explained that there are creative solutions to the problem of ectopic pregnancies: "Sometimes when an ectopic pregnancy comes in, the attendant will say, 'Send this patient to the best ultrasound doctor.' And I'll say, 'No, send her to the least-experienced ultrasound doctor.' He'll say, 'I can't find a heartbeat here.' Then we can operate."



In the United States, this conundrum is only beginning to emerge, as it did on "Meet the Press" in October 2004, when Tim Russert, the host, asked Jim DeMint, a South Carolina Republican representative then in the middle of what turned out to be a successful campaign for the U.S. Senate, to explain his position in favor of a total ban on all abortion procedures. DeMint was reluctant to answer Russert's repeated question: Would you prosecute a woman who had an abortion? DeMint said he thought Congress should outlaw all abortions first and worry about the fallout later. "We've got to make laws first that protect life," he said.

French woman sues Opus Dei, claims brainwashing

via:AFP

The thing that some MK Ultra researchers are missing is that the mind control techniques formalized by the US and British intelligence community are ultimately based in ancient occult practices that have been preserved and studied for centuries by religious organizations, with the Vatican chief among those groups most frequently named. What differentiates MK Ultra and Monarch Project techniques from those practiced by both the Egyptian priesthood and Roman Catholic Inquisitors is that they are informed by science, with input from rigorously trained psychiatrists and programmers who have access to the cutting edge of expensive, newly developed technologies. However, the core of the program can be found in books like the Egyptian Book of the Dead, which codifies methods of drugging, hypnosis and physical torture, techniques that were then cataloged and maintained by occult organizations, including mainstream religious institutions.

Because many will remain dubious of these claims, I will provide several examples with the warning that these first hand accounts contain graphic descriptions of sexual violence, so anyone who has a history in programs of this variety is urged to proceed with caution. Here is a link to an account from Illuminati-news, similar to the disclosures of Maria Monk, as well as another story from the David Icke forum, accounts so horrifying that I'm not sure I would believe them without having had friends who've been through the exact same type of cult activity. For the third link, just scroll down the page to the posts by Nobodyswife to see an example of exactly what the Roman Catholic pedophila scandals are all about, namely, a highly organized network of child traffickers who believe they have been given immunity from the law. The purpose of this post is not to attack Christianity but instead to encourage people to find common cause in exposing and eradicating those networks wherever they are found, in Christian, occult and secular worlds alike.

French woman sues Opus Dei, claims brainwashing

By Dorothee Moisan (AFP) – Jun 28, 2011

PARIS — A French woman claiming to have been brainwashed by the secretive Catholic society Opus Dei is suing it for allegedly keeping her illegally as a domestic servant, she told AFP Tuesday.

Catherine T., who asked not to be identified by her family name, said she joined a hoteliers' school in northeastern France in 1985, aged 14, which she later discovered was run by associates of Opus Dei...."You were forbidden to talk about it to your parents." She said the group compelled her to take vows of obedience, poverty and chastity and for the following 13 years gave her jobs with organisations that her lawyer Rodolphe Bosselut said were linked to Opus Dei.

She said she was made to work 14-hour days, seven days a week, cleaning and serving. Staff paid her a salary and then reclaimed money from her by making her sign blank cheques, supposedly to pay her room and board, she alleged.

She added that staff accompanied her wherever she went, including on visits to the doctor. On these occasions she was taken to see an Opus Dei doctor who prescribed tranquilisers that left her "senseless".

Catherine weighed only 39 kilogrammes (86 pounds) in 2001 when her parents rescued her from the group. more...