Nova Scotia bishop to face child porn charges

And yet nothing seems to change!!

Leon Podles indicates that Bishop Lahey's interest in porn may have been reported witnessed decades ago.

The Vatican accomodates a sudden resignation request, dropping Lahey like a hot potato.

Archbishop Mancini is apparently blindsided in that neither Lahey nor the Vatican, but the media seems to have been the bearer of the bad news.

The priesthood should not be a band of independent contractors, dispensing religious services and otherwise doing their own thing.

The Pope, Cardinals and Bishops cannot lead us if they cannot manage themslves.

Well, I guess this speaks for itself. When in God's name, and in the name of all that is holy, will Catholics finally realize that there is a sickness within their church that is so pervasive, that nothing short of dismantling the entire structure and rebuilding it brick by brick will do. And yet parents continue to offer up their children to these individuals every day. Wake up!

"In a television interview with CTV News Sept. 30, Archbishop Mancini said Pope Benedict must have known the grave reasons behind Bishop Lahey's resignation, but that he and the others in the Antigonish Diocese were unaware of them."

OF COURSE, the Pope knew about it....and did nothing, as usual.

My heart goes out to those in my diocese and to those around the courty that are victims of clergy abuse, who have to now go through the mindless soul ripping re-triggering and mental rage that this brings to the surface.

My heart also goes out to the children in those photographs that were exploited and violated, and drooled over by a man who sat in a cathedra and whom taught us all what the Good Sheperd was and is all about.

I sincerely hope people pray, pray, pray...

Kelly Mathews

Marquette Diocese Clergy Watch
Marquette, MI

This story is further evidence of the sickness that is systemic in the Church today. None dares call it what it is: evil Who will perform the exorcism to rid us of it?

Good for the Ottawa & Custom Border Police who did their job & were not swayed by the prominence of the powerful Churchman!
I guess the difference is that the police got to him before the Church could offer him a job in Vatican City, a la Cardinal Law, formerly of Boston, MA.

This sexual depravity of so many bishops and priests is so pervasive in the church. The popes, JPII and BXVI, were and are instumental in tolerating this type of abuse of children, seminarians , accepting it and letting it continue unabaited. The popes sent out directives to all the dioceses in written instructions on how to silence the victims and hide, move the perpetrators so the pedophile priests ended up abusing more victims.

The rot is also at the top of the hierarchy. The pope must think it is the right of clergy to be able to prey on Catholic children, especially the boys, and Catholic youths, seminarians and younger priests. His concern was to keep it hidden, keep it quiet, avoid or lessen or squelch the scandal news. We must redo the entire hierarchy and system, we must ordain women too and married and rid the church of the rot at the top.

We need more bishops like Rembert Weakland. Faithful to Church teaching and free of the scandal of abuse. Wait, wasn't he a heretic who admitted sodomizing men and embezzling money to pay them off? Sorry, I must have been thinking of someone else.

Thanks be to God, there is still the Holy Spirit who guides the Church, just as Jesus said He would (Jn 14)

The mystics tell us that each of us chose the lives we live before we are born. Even though we may not consciously remember making that choice. What is important however, is that our choice, regardless of the outcome, is lived out to fulfill God’s ultimate plan to perfection. So why would we chose darkness? Again, the mystics tell us that without darkness we would not appreciate the Light that the Creator continually sends forth among us. The choice is ours.

The recent fall of Bishop Raymond J. Lahey was therefore no accident, and it is we that need to learn from it. To help us to put this situation in its proper context, we might benefit from the following Kabbalistic teaching:

"It is heartening to realize that the most negative situations invariably hold the greatest promise for positive growth, for ours is a world of exquisite balance. Therefore, the ultimate darkness is inherently transformable into the brightest of Light.

Each of us is born with the power to transform our nature completely and to achieve a personal state of [the Christ] within. Instead of experiencing guilt or shame- or even worse, apathy-as a consequence of our negative actions, we should be inspired by the opportunity to reshape our soul into the greatest [receptacle] for the Light [of God]".

The events and circumstances that brought Bishop Lahey to this point will have to remain an mystery. However, we all share his ‘brokenness’ in one way or another. In a world of pain and suffering there is no scale which measures which ‘sin’ is greater than another. Neither are there any exceptions. Sexual deviations have been with us since time first began. But now is the time for all of us, especially the Church, to exercise Christ’s compassion and understanding. Perhaps we could begin by asking ourselves why we are faced with a pandemic of sexual abuse among the clergy? And, what is it saying about us as members of the world community? Is it perhaps time to bring Light to the situation, free of condemnation and full of compassion? For the Church, and all of us, It is time to explore a healthier approach to our God given sexuality! The Light is among us, we no longer need to hide in darkness.

In our diocese several years ago, a newly appointed assistant pastor discovered that the pastor had a VERY large collection of child pornography. When the assistant pastor took his complaint to the bishop, the bishop did nothing. When the assistant pastor went public with his complaint, the bishop was forced to take action and he removed the assistant pastor. The pastor with a VERY large collection of child pornography is still a pastor. I do not know where the assistant pastor has gone.

I think change will come. Despite what we've subsequently learned about Lahey, before he resigned, he did broker a just settlement and offered apology to victims of predator priests in our diocese - This was not the result of a court order, but an attempt to offer what justice could be offered (while still acknowledging that nothing can compensate for child sexual abuse). Perhaps it took one who knew himself a sinner to act before ordered to do so by a court.

I am heartened by the tone of the letter our archbishop sent out in response to the Lahey situation, which said in part:
"If our church is to get beyond our present difficulties, if we hope to have any significant future, we must learn the lessons which these last years of struggle point to. One of these lessons
is for all of us to have a better understanding of what constitutes a human person. People,priests, bishops are human, and failure to see, recognize and care about this will continue to produce inhuman expectations and give rise to inhuman behaviour. Another lesson is that failure
in pastoral leadership is also connected to a misunderstanding of the diverse relationships which are needed to hold together the community of faith."
see
http://www.antigonishdiocese.com/2009%2010%2002%20All%20RC%20of%20NS.pdf

Our diocese is poor and was facing church closures even before the settlement. Priests are in very short supply, but the diocese has an excellent training porgram for lay ministers - and of course most of thsoe are women. In the long run, we will have fewer but stronger grass roots parishes - with fewer oil bills, there will be more money for adult catechesis and social justice ministy. Even the editor of the area's main secular newspaper sees possible church renewal brought about by current crisis:

http://www.capebretonpost.com/index.cfm?sid=291777&sc=150#

The truly sad part of this story is that The Bishop of Rome will continue to appoint right wingers as bishops and the dysfunctional appointees will do even MORE damage to the Church's already tainted credibility!

I feel so sorry for that poor sick man, as well as deep sorrow for those he victimized. That stuff is toxic and it leads otherwise good people into such utter darkness; it is the slipperiest of slopes.

It is right that he is removed from ministry, it is right that he be punished for the times he crossed the line from what was merely immoral and a violation of his sacred promises into what is so wrong that even liberal democracies outlaw it (his sin is one I don't even want to state by name).

Lord have mercy on him. And Lord save us from whatever sins we are weak to, that we might be spared the decent from human weakness to blasphemous evil in our own lives.

I could not imagine saying Mass or ministering as a bishop with such things hanging over my head. I'd feel the weight of my promised millstone every time I'd put my collar on. I would be paralyzed by guilt. Yes, I could be freed through absolution, but if this was a chronic thing, I would hope I would have the lucidity to get help.

Luckily, God protects the Church and the unworthiness of her ministers does not effect the grace she gives nor the soundness of her teaching, but scandal still hits close to home.

It should be noted that he is not being accused of molesting a child (small comfort). Not many bishops have been caught up in the scandal but for the few exposed, one has to wonder how they were selected as bishops in the first place. Things improved under JPII but even he was snookered by a few. Rome needs to be especially careful in how they harvest bishops from the priest crop!

Will the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy realize that it has very little moral authority when it comes to its teachings on sexuality?

Other Christian churches have women priests and married priests and those priests do a wonderful job. Those churches don't have the shortage of priests that the RCC has. In fact, congregations have many candidates to select from, and a competitive selection process is not a bad thing.

As long as the RCC only accepts male priests and forces them to be celibate, there will be a shortage of priests. To compensate, some men who shouldn't be priests get through the system.

For example, my parent's church had a priest from India (or Sri Lanka?) who preached that the tsunami was God's punishment of people who didn't go to church on that day. This priest was also paranoid and fired all of the lay leaders of that congregation, such as the deacons, etc. He was finally replaced, but it took far too long.

I know excellent RCC priests, so I don't mean to disparage the majority of priests. The RCC hierarchy is seriously damaging the Church's moral authority. When will they realize they are a millstone around the neck of the Church?

Only when the Church realizes that we have allowed priests the gift of
"privilege" will we understand what is happening in this Church. So many of the offenders have been scooted off and hidden somewhere only to resurface again. Here we have a bishop in Nova Scotia who actively battled with the scandal situation in his area. He announced a "$13 million settlement agreement for a class action lawsuit for clergy sexual abuse dating back to the 1950s" back in August. Not a month later, we find out he is amidst those who caused this horror to occur!!

America is not burdered by such problems now! We seem to have other issues, or perhaps I should say fears here! The Vatican is trying to have the American Faithful cough up $1.2 Million to come and study those "women religious," while the men of the Church keep acting like adolescents left home alone for an evening!!!!

Only when we accept that the men of this church ARE the problem. This is not a problem of gay or straight. This is about men - sexual beings who have spent many years with lovers, wives, live ins and the like, because they COULD and because they were protected!

That is not to say there are many good priests. But,there are indeed, those who laugh at the idea of celibacy. Celibacy is not working! Here we are in the 21st Century with a broken Church and the UCCB is about to write a letter about marriage!!!!! Please God, that the silent few who are still sitting out there don't go running out of those Churches, while the letter from our formidable American Bishops is read! Perhaps they could read it in Latin, which might please the Holy Father!

It is time for us to acknowledge that we need women ordained. Period! And, please don't write about what will happen in our seminaries! They will all get along, like police and fire departments and infantry units and everything else where women have been integrated!

Until we have women come forth and actively take part in the administration of this church, we will continue to have the sins of the Fathers disgrace this Church, until there is no more church to disgrace!

We have had 2,000 years of men running this Church, and it is a mess! Many of us now refuse to actively participate in a Church where we have been marginalized by the offensive words of the hierarchy again and again.

But, the Holy Spirit has not left..... and She is NOT happy!

Time to clean House!

When I saw this response to Lahey's previous alligations, not only was I angry but it has become very clear that the church does not get it...

"Archbishop Martin Currie confirmed Tuesday that officials with the Roman Catholic Church were aware of Earle's allegations against Lahey in 1989.

"To possess pornography was not a crime then as it is now," he said. "It's still not the behaviour I would expect from a priest to have pornography in his home when young people are around."

Earle, who was a victim of sexual abuse at Newfoundland's Mount Cashel Orphanage in the 1980s, said that hearing about the charges last week awakened old traumatic memories. "

It is time to open every living priest's personnel file, if there is a hint of impropriety, they should be removed from parish duties. If there is any complaints that are considered a crime (today), they turned over for prosecution and defrocked if found guity.

Protecting criminals must stop. If this means a shortage of priests (which I don't beleive it will) so be it. Parishes may have to merge or share the remaining priest. But the "privledge boys club" must come to an end. The church can no longer be trusted to deal with this problem. This case is a prime example. They knew his past, and still promoted him. After dealing with 20 years of litigation they should be aware that a pedophile can not be reformed and there is always more than one victim. (A celibate pedophile is not an acceptable solution).

The church wonders why membership is falling in North America, any slightly educated person knows right from wrong, and will not follow blindly Bishops who make statement like Archbishop Martin Currie. This "circling the wagons" mentality must stop. If the Bishops are incapable of doing what needs to be done, they should be removed from their position.

This may not be a forgiving attitute for an RC, but this is a problem where time in the confessional will not help. It is a sever psychological mental illness that can not be cured. They must be removed to have NO access to children. We can work on forgiveness once the children are safe.