Described as “an atomic bomb dropped on the Roman Curia,” a former Apostolic Nuncio to the United States has accused Pope Francis of covering up some Cardinal sins.
I was just sitting on my bunk in my prison cell on Sunday night, August 26, after a tiring day on multiple fronts. I went through the day without a single message on the GTL tablet I was holding. It was unusual, the calm before the storm. I spent a few minutes at night playing one of its solitaire games that I can never seem to win. Several, minutes later I exited the game to find a surprise. In that brief ten minutes, l9 messages had come into my GTL in-box. Before the night was over, there were nine more.
The summer of Catholic scandal had just detonated its third and most explosive bomb, and several readers sent me alerts and commentary. Archbishop Carlo María Viganò (pro. “vee-ga-NO”), a former Apostolic Nuncio to the United States, published an 11-page letter on two Catholic websites.
The published letter charged that Pope Francis, six months after assuming the papacy in 2013, revoked restrictions placed by Pope Benedict XVI on the ministry of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick when Pope Benedict learned of his history of sexual abuse of seminarians. Archbishop Viganò claims that he personally made Pope Francis aware that Cardinal McCarrick had been restricted to a life of prayer and penance, but simply ignored it.
The letter also claimed, among other charges, that Pope Francis ignored it as well, restoring Cardinal McCarrick to a position of power and influence as a papal advisor. Cardinal McCarrick, according to the letter, thus became instrumental in the naming of two other American prelates, Cardinal Joseph Tobin in Newark and Cardinal Blase Cupich in Chicago.
On the day this all exploded, it made for dismal reading long into the night. You need a scorecard to sort out the details of this three-strike story. First in the summer of Catholic scandal came revelations that Cardinal McCarrick, age 88, stands accused of groping a 16-year-old boy in the sacristy of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City in 1971, long before he became a bishop and then a cardinal.
The claim has been presented as both credible and substantiated, but in a post, on These Stone Walls (linked below) I described this to be a matter related more to expediency than evidence. “Credible” simply means that both McCarrick and the 16-year-old lived in New York City in 1971. “Substantiated” is another matter and, absent evidence, eyewitness testimony, or an admission of the accused – and there were none of these – it defies belief. As I have pointed out, the 16-year-old is now 63.
But this bombshell has morphed into a bigger one that is far more credible and substantiated. A barrage of sordid stories has emerged about Cardinal McCarrick engaging in a decades-long pattern of homosexual predation of seminarians and younger priests. He became notorious for this, the current disclaimers of bishops notwithstanding.
These tales, and those of his now infamous beach house were familiar to many former seminarians and priests east of the Mississippi in the 1980s and 1990s. I was one of them. Meanwhile, every bishop and fellow prelate has either feigned ignorance or kept silent. In “Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and the Homosexual Matrix,” I speculated upon three questions:
- Who knew what and when did they know it?
- What did they do once they did know it?
- Why is this all coming up now?
The central point of that post was something that each of the polar camps seldom considers as this story heightens a debate about the moral prerequisites for priesthood:
“I have encountered another condition among many, but certainly not all, homosexual seminarians and priests. I found the prevalence of narcissistic personality disorder among them to be inordinately high. Perhaps it is inordinately high in the wider “gay community” as well.
I believe it is this disorder, and not simply same-sex attraction, that is the real impediment to Holy Orders. It is this that must be detected and treated as an impediment for seminary candidates. Narcissistic personality disorder is one of the most difficult personality disorders to treat and modify. One of its symptoms is the objectification of others for one’s own gratification.”
In other words, there is a developmental and psychological difference between a person who experiences same-sex attraction but remains celibate, and one who becomes a predator. Behaviors such as stalking and grooming are inherently narcissistic.
But before anyone launches a Catholic witch hunt, narcissism is a pathology not at all related to sexual orientation, although I and others have cited a higher presence of narcissistic behavior among homosexual men than heterosexual men. This was supported in a subsequent article by Dr. Rick Fitzgibbons, MD, on LifeSiteNews.
I did not intend to analyze Cardinal McCarrick in the above post, but if the behaviors with seminarians now attributed to him are true, then one could legitimately conclude that he became a manipulative, narcissistic predator. Some of what Archbishop Viganò now alleges in his 11-page bombshell letter lends credibility to this. He wrote that McCarrick was privately disciplined for these behaviors by Pope Benedict XVI in 2009, but the Cardinal “openly flouted the papal sanctions.”
THE SECOND BOMBSHELL: PENNSYLVANIA
The news media, for the most part, looked the other way during the Cardinal McCarrick bombshell, and the reasons for that were political. I examined them in “Cardinal Sins: A Puppet Show from the Sexual Revolution.” Then, in early August, another bomb dropped, this time in Pennsylvania but with reverberations across the country and around the world.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro published a Grand Jury report that exposed 300 Pennsylvania priests accused of sexually abusing 1,000 victims over a period of seventy years. Nothing in this report is new, some of it is untrue, and much of it is politically motivated. I wrote about this report in detail in “That Grand Jury Report on Abusive Catholic Priests.”
I think I speak for many conscientious Catholics when I say that we have grown tired of upwardly mobile political careerists like AG Shapiro who allude that questioning claimants or asking for evidence “re-victimizes the victims.” Claims in the Pennsylvania report date back as far as World War II and most of the priests accused are long deceased. Many others who are still living were denied any opportunity to defend themselves. There are serious flaws, and multiple injustices, associated with this report.
The news media that ignored or minimized the Cardinal McCarrick story pounced on the Pennsylvania story ignoring its many flaws, lack of due process and substantiation, and the fact that it was a grotesque abuse of the grand jury system. It served a purpose for the leftist media by momentarily moving the spotlight back onto the moral panic about child abuse and of a politically less desirable truth: that homosexual predatory behavior has been the real ground-zero of the crisis.
That crisis is manifested in a 50-year history of narcissistic homosexual inclination and behavior among a significant number of seminarians, priests, and bishops. And according to Archbishop Viganò’s published letter, it is a reality with tentacles that have reached deeply into Vatican affairs.
The hypocrisy it has borne along with it never ceases. In light of the third and biggest bombshell, the accusations brought by Archbishop Viganò, USCCB President Daniel Cardinal Dinardo had this to say:
“Archbishop Viganò’s letter raised questions that deserve answers that are conclusive and based on evidence. Without those answers, innocent men may be tainted by false accusations and the guilty may be left to repeat sins of the past.”
I agree. But with all due respect, Your Eminence, there are many accused U.S. priests who deserve answers that are conclusive and based on evidence. Innocent men have been tainted – imprisoned even – by false accusations, and Cardinal McCarrick is evidence that some of the apparently guilty have been left to repeat the sins of the past. The US Bishops’ Dallas Charter applied only to priests while exempting bishops.
THE “ATOMIC BOMB” AND ITS FALLOUT
Now, with the revelations of Archbishop Carlo María Viganò, it seems that some who feigned shock over Cardinal McCarrick already knew, and had known for years, about his history of luring seminarians into a homosexual Catholic subculture of predation, compromise, and secrecy.
Archbishop Viganò’s document alleges that he personally informed Pope Francis of the above in Rome shortly after the conclave of 2013. Without apparent consultation with Pope Emeritus Benedict, Pope Francis met with McCarrick, appeared to revoke the canonical sanctions imposed by Pope Benedict, and restored Cardinal McCarrick to a position of power and influence. The media coverage of this story has been amazing. A lead editorial in The Wall Street Journal (“Pope Francis in the Dock,” August 29, 2018) chided the left for downplaying the story:
“The archbishop’s charges have split the Catholic community. Some defend [Acb. Viganò’s] reputation for honesty and professionalism while others suggest he is motivated by dislike for Pope Francis. Some secular defenders who like the pope’s politics, and are stalwarts of the #MeToo movement, want to excuse the episode… But motives are irrelevant here, or at least should be. The question is whether the archbishop’s claims are true.”
In an op-ed in The New York Times (“A Catholic Civil War?” August 27, 2018) First Things senior editor Matthew Schmitz described the fallout of the bombs of summer of 2018 and Archbishop Viganò’s letter to be evidence of our polar ideologies:
“No matter what Francis does now, the Catholic Church has been plunged into all-out civil war. On one side are the traditionalists, who insist that abuse can be prevented only by tighter adherence to church doctrine. On the other side are liberals, who demand that the church cease condemning homosexual acts and allow gay priests to step out of the closet.”
I do not at all agree with this assessment of the state of affairs in the Holy See. This is not a matter of simple polarity, but of truth. Getting at that truth is something owed to the Church. How best to do this is the next big question. Some more conservative commentators have cast a series of doubts about the integrity of Pope Francis in the light of what is presently alleged. Others on the left attack Viganò.
Those in the media, often of a more liberal mindset, have suggested that Archbishop Viganò should be treated with a degree of skepticism. John Allen, formerly Rome Correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter and presently president of Crux Catholic Media wrote that “The proper attitude is to take [the Viganò letter] seriously but with a large grain of salt [and] healthy skepticism.”
Mr. Allen cited as a reason for “healthy skepticism” Archbishop Viganò’s “unsubstantiated” accusations against other church leaders in the same document, and the Archbishop’s history as an emphatic critic of the pope’s liberal views on divorce and homosexuality. The Rev. Robert Imbelli, emeritus professor of theology at Boston College – in the epicenter of the 2002 abuse scandal – suggested that the pope “leaves it to journalists and their professional competence to evaluate the truth.”
I am sorry, but “journalists and their professional competence” may seem a cruel joke to anyone who has been victimized the news media’s total lack of John Allen’s “healthy skepticism” when it comes to coverage – and the most basic truth-telling – about Catholic scandal. For the best commentary on the media’s lack of “healthy skepticism” see Joan Wypijewski’s courageous media comeuppance: “Spotlight Oscar Hangover: Why ‘Spotlight Is a Terrible Film.”
VIGANO: IMPECCABLE INTEGRITY OR CAPED CRUSADER?
Despite some of the aspersions against his integrity and motives, any honest assessment of Archbishop Viganò’s Vatican-based career can lead to only one conclusion. He has been a servant of the Church of the highest caliber, exhibiting moral fortitude and integrity – sometimes at great cost to himself.
In 2012, the Vatican’s most powerful powerbroker under Pope Benedict XVI, Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, engineered a plot to move Acb. Viganò out of Rome. He was transferred against his will from his position as Deputy Governor of Vatican City to a post as Apostolic Nuncio to the United States, a position that Viganò interpreted as “exile.”
America is not normally considered a place of exile, but it’s easy to understand why Viganò saw it that way. His reforms in the financial structure of Vatican City halted the scourge of nepotism and corruption. His department went from a 10 million Euro Debt to a 30 million Euro surplus in one year. He ended corrupt contracts and replaced them with legitimate ones. In the ordinary course, this would be a good reason to keep him around.
So his “exile” was perplexing. His letter of appeal to Pope Benedict was never answered when he was sent to Washington DC. It was from this move that Acb. Viganò was unwittingly placed in a position between the affairs of Rome and the Archdiocese of Washington where, he says, Cardinal Donald Wuerl also became keenly aware of censures placed on Cardinal McCarrick by Pope Benedict, but chose not to enforce them. Cardinal Wuerl denies this, a position that grows weaker by the day.
Journalist and Vatican observer, Taylor Marshall has composed a fascinating 17-minute presentation of the historical background of all this including its various tentacles. I recommend it.
This is not the last word. Without doubt, there is more to come. Until it does, I am a loyal and steadfast supporter of the pope until clear evidence loosens that knot. Nonetheless, every visible and credible source measures Archbishop Carlo María Viganò as a man of great integrity and courage. We would all be fools not to listen.
Editor’s Note: Please Share this important post. And please consider these other related posts from Father Gordon MacRae and These Stone Walls:
- Five Years of Pope Francis in a Time of Heresy
- The Chief Priests Answered: “We Have No King But Caesar”
- Pope Francis and the Lost Sheep of a Lonely Revolution
- Pope Francis Has a Challenge for the Prodigal Son’s Older Brother
MaryJean says
Hi Fr. Gordon!
I fear that this will get much worse before we see daylight.
This is really nothing new if you read the history of the popes and what was going on around their reigns. There have been quite a few “bad” popes but the Church prevails. It is not the human part that will fix this. It will be through intervention, as it was in the beginning, is now and forever will be. If I was a betting person, my money is on Archbishop Vigano.
Sending love and prayers , Mary Jean
Jeannie says
I wrote a very long piece yesterday and I don’t see it today and I’m pretty on board with that. It was divisive and this column is doing its level best to remind us that unity and disagreement NEED to be actively pursued.
I have evidence of wrongdoing that is substantiated by many of these high in the hierarchy, but Christ’s goal here is something bigger than finger pointing.
Father Gordon, like Christ, finds himself in a situation where people of malice and influence deliberately rigged events to catch an innocent man in a maelstrom of hysteria and injustice. In Christ’s case elements of jealousy, self-interest and outright contempt of God played a part. In Father Gordon’s case I don’t know about the jealousy (although reports of some of his successes in his ministry and his GOOD and pure relations with youth – as opposed to some who clearly viewed young men as targets for corruption and exploitation -make me think that this could have factored into it as well), but there can be no question that self-interest and contempt of God, on the part of the church, the lying accusers, the judges, the lawyers, politicians and the media, played a role in the witch hunt that landed him in a terrifying situation.
It’s uncanny how Father Gordon has helped the world outside with insight about his more insular world and how now the world outside SHARES more with his world. His insight is, as some of his mentors suggested it would, invaluable for all who God gives the grace to see it.
Yesterday I mentioned a film against abortion, “Gosnell The Movie”, that is opening October 12 and depicts the real life horror of a doctor who performed unsafe abortions, kept babies in jars like a mad doctor and murdered live babies moments after their birth.
I said that a great deal of my ambivalence about this pope – and the many others who figure in this scandal – would be relieved if I saw them take up the banner and give praise and exposure to this film. The many who are raging and fomenting about the mouth about the flood of molestation in ALL of the CAtholic church, will surely be raging as much if not more that their sacred rite of baby killing is being shown in a bad light.
Bad is being called good and good is being called evil.
We follow God and so this is a storm surge far more violent than a Category 2 or a Category 4 hurricane storm surge.
Nature’s violence is permitted by God and for those of us who recognize this with awe and fear and respect, it’s humbling to realize that whatever catastrophe that ultimately befalls the southeast, God appears to still be restraining His mighty force and it is far less severe than what our inaction against all this evil merits.
The homosexuals in the Catholic church would not be so powerful had the sexual revolution and the pill not made sins of the flesh and the normalizing of removing the protection of innocence and of the traditional family the direction of the world. To excuse and to encourage a promiscuous lifestyle in those afflicted with same sex attraction is to rob them of their true identity, the version of themselves that God intended for them if they accepted the grace to live a life chaste and free to explore the potential of their gifts.
When you add the affliction of the injection of secular and atheist ideologies that many in our church suffered in their education growing up, it becomes a little easier to have compassion for these now wreaking havoc in the upper hierarchy.
God has been allowing us to see that we need to fall down on our knees and beg for His mercy and His guidance and He has done this by staying His hand from inflicting the wrath that Our Lady has let us know that He feels from our offenses.
I thank you for this column because this helpless feeling needs to be alleviated through prayer, surrender and humility, not fear, hysteria and calls for punishment on a grand scale.
I have no answers and that is a grace that allows me to read you, trusting that what you are writing comes from the heart of one who IS praying, surrendering and pursuing humility at a level that inspires and gratifies me.
God bless you.
Helen says
This is so informative, so helpful, filling in the words I often cannot reach. Thank you Jeannie for all of your wise words and thoughts. You really help me get in touch with so many feelings.
God bless…..
Helen
Michael says
May God deliver you from every evil, Father Gordon. Thank you for your wise words.
Mary Ann says
Bravo, Father Gordon—for this fair and judicious assessment!
Tom says
Great article. Politician Shapiro showed his agenda on the Today Show as he railed about ancient history…some true and some not…but would not admit that since the draconian Dallas Charter in 2002, new cases of child sexual abuse in the church have become almost nonexistent and even a mere allegation is the end of any priest’s ministry…even if proven false! Narcissistic personality disorder is a real problem in the church and perhaps THAT should be the focus for reform.
Lupe says
I have been looking forward to some analysis of the Vigano charges. Thank you for your insights. It has occurred to me that the outpouring g of allegations of a “lavender mafia” and it’s frightening influence might explain the sad intersection in your own story of coming upon the sexual improprieties of other priests,then being railroaded by your own diocese.
Fr Stuart MacDonald says
Fr Gordon
As usual, you provide us with the calm, unhurried reasoning we need. You remind us of the wider, and often forgotten, issues of due process for priests (and bishops, nuncios, cardinals), searching for truth instead of political gain and filial respect for the Holy Father. I don’t know how you do it. I really don’t. God bless and reward you for your priestly example that, like the blood of martyrs, fertilizes the seedbed of faith. I beg your blessing.
Fr Stuart
Helen says
The Catholic Heart breaks.
Hello Fr. Gordon. Thank you for your honest and candid blogs. You’ve surely saved my sanity, at times. This is such a sad state of affairs. I want for this to go away so badly and yet, I believe this must be in the open in order to weed out the bugs. The Lord did say He wanted the weeds to grow with the wheat. Is this our chastisement? Perhaps this is how He heals. I hope so.
Bless your incredible heart, Fr. Gordon. What stamina, what fortitude, especially, with you where you are and having the guts to post what you do, does take courage.
Once again, thank you for all that you do. I thank God for you. Where we would go to get a clear picture of this living nightmare if you weren’t here to help us see the Truth?
God bless and deliver you from that hell.
Helen
Jeannie says
Helen, this was so spot on, thank you:
“This is such a sad state of affairs. I want for this to go away so badly and yet, I believe this must be in the open in order to weed out the bugs. The Lord did say He wanted the weeds to grow with the wheat. Is this our chastisement? Perhaps this is how He heals. I hope so.”
Nkechi says
Really well written and puts the issues in perspective for me. The big question I have is why Cardinal Vigano chose to bring this up when he did.
Carlos Caso-Rosendi says
Monsignor Viganò has mortally wounded the lavender mafia. However, do not expect they will go without a fight. They are a vicious, godless collective. They have a vocation for power and they have reached the upper positions where they can sack and destroy at will. The Church will emerge purified from this ordeal but much may be lost or destroyed. The priests of Baal rule the land and this is our “Elijah at Mount Carmel” moment. Soon those false priests shall be no more but we must pray for God’s warriors and for those like Fr Gordon who are fighting from the trenches. God bless you Fr Gordon. I guess by now you know your liberation is near. Always a pleasure to read your articles.