Catholic Church – Page 9 – Infinite Unknown

Church: Pope Had Role in Moving Molesting Priest

March 31, 2010March 13, 2010 by Infinite

– Pope knew priest was paedophile but allowed him to continue with ministry (Times)

– Pope will struggle to survive abuse scandal (Irish Independent)

– Benedict’s involvement ‘shows extent of cover-ups’ (Irish Independent)

– Sinead O’Connor: I’d help Jesus to burn down the Vatican (Irish Independent)

– RIGHTS-GERMANY: ‘Catholic Church Protects Paedophile Priests’ (IPS)

– Child abuse claims sweep Catholic Church in Europe (AP)

Pope Benedict XVI prays in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem on May 15, 2009. Photographer: Yannis Behrakis/Pool via Bloomberg News

March 12 (Bloomberg) — Pope Benedict XVI, during his tenure as archbishop of Munich, played a role in a decision to move a priest accused of sexual molestation to his diocese to undergo therapy, the church said today.

The priest was later reassigned by another church official and committed more abuse, the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising said in a statement on its Web site. Benedict, at the time Archbishop Joseph Ratzinger, “was involved” in a 1980 decision to move the priest, identified only as “H.,” from a church in Essen, Germany, to a rectory in the Munich region for treatment, the diocese said.

A former vicar-general in the church administration, Gerhard Gruber, subsequently allowed the accused priest to continue pastoral duties, during which he committed abuse and was convicted by a court in 1986. Gruber said in the statement that the decision to re-post “H.” was his alone.

“The repeated employment of ‘H.’ in pastoral duties was a serious mistake,” Gruber said. “I take full responsibility for this and I deeply regret that this decision led to offenses against youths — I apologize to all those who were harmed by this.”

A wave of allegations of sexual abuse by Catholic priests has emerged in Germany this year, beginning at an elite Jesuit high school in Berlin, Canisius-Kolleg. The head of the German Bishops’ Conference, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, last month issued an apology to more than 100 pedophilia victims, echoing Benedict’s statement that such abuse is a “heinous crime.”

Chief Exorcist Father Gabriele Amorth Says Devil Is In The Vatican

May 8, 2014March 11, 2010 by Infinite

Don Gabriele Amorth is the chief exorcist at the Vatica

Sex abuse scandals in the Roman Catholic Church are proof that that “the Devil is at work inside the Vatican”, according to the Holy See’s chief exorcist.

Father Gabriele Amorth, 85, who has been the Vatican’s chief exorcist for 25 years and says he has dealt with 70,000 cases of demonic possession, said that the consequences of satanic infiltration included power struggles at the Vatican as well as “cardinals who do not believe in Jesus, and bishops who are linked to the Demon”.

He added: “When one speaks of ‘the smoke of Satan’ [a phrase coined by Pope Paul VI in 1972] in the holy rooms, it is all true – including these latest stories of violence and paedophilia.”

He claimed that another example of satanic behaviour was the Vatican “cover-up” over the deaths in 1998 of Alois Estermann, the then commander of the Swiss Guard, his wife and Corporal Cedric Tornay, a Swiss Guard, who were all found shot dead. “They covered up everything immediately,” he said. “Here one sees the rot”.

A remarkably swift Vatican investigation concluded that Corporal Tornay had shot the commander and his wife and then turned his gun on himself after being passed over for a medal. However Tornay’s relatives have challenged this. There have been unconfirmed reports of a homosexual background to the tragedy and the involvement of a fourth person who was never identfied.

Vatican Hit By Gay Sex Scandal

March 6, 2010 by Infinite

Vatican chorister sacked for allegedly procuring male prostitutes for papal gentleman-in-waiting

Pope Benedict XVI greets cardinals in the Clementine Hall at the Vatican. Photograph: Max Rossi/AFP/Getty Images

The Vatican was today rocked by a sex scandal reaching into Pope Benedict’s household after a chorister was sacked for allegedly procuring male prostitutes for a papal gentleman-in-waiting.

Angelo Balducci, a Gentleman of His Holiness, was caught by police on a wiretap allegedly negotiating with Thomas Chinedu Ehiem, a 29-year-old Vatican chorister, over the specific physical details of men he wanted brought to him. Transcripts in the possession of the Guardian suggest that numerous men may have been procured for Balducci, at least one of whom was studying for the priesthood.

The explosive claims about Balducci’s private life have caused grave embarrassment to the Vatican, which has yet to publicly comment on the affair.

While Catholicism does not condemn homosexuality outright, its teaching is that homosexual acts “are intrinsically disordered”. The Catechism of the Catholic church states unequivocally: “Under no circumstances can they be approved.”

Balducci was arrested on 10 February, suspected of involvement in widespread corruption. A senior Italian government official, he is alleged to have to steered public works contracts towards favoured bidders. He has not been charged.

It was during this investigation into corruption that wiretaps revealed his alleged sexual activity. In one conversation, Ehiem tells Balducci: “I saw your call when I was in the Vatican, because I was doing rehearsals … in the choir … in St Peter’s.” He then suggests Balducci meet a man who he describes is “two metres tall … 97 kilos … aged 33, completely active.”

Balducci is also a senior adviser to the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples, the department that oversees the Roman Catholic church’s worldwide missionary activities.

Poland: Priest checks fingerprints for mass attendance

February 7, 2010 by Infinite

WARSAW (Reuters) – A Polish priest has installed an electronic reader in his church for schoolchildren to leave their fingerprints in order to monitor their attendance at mass, the Gazeta Wyborcza daily said on Friday.

Oddly Enough

The pupils will mark their fingerprints every time they go to church over three years and if they attend 200 masses they will be freed from the obligation of having to pass an exam prior to their confirmation, the paper said.

The pupils in the southern town of Gryfow Slaski told the daily they liked the idea and also the priest, Grzegorz Sowa, who invented it.

“This is comfortable. We don’t have to stand in a line to get the priest’s signature (confirming our presence at the mass) in our confirmation notebooks,” said one pupil, who gave her name as Karolina.

‘Systematic’ Sexual Abuse at Berlin Catholic School

February 3, 2010February 3, 2010 by Infinite

Jesuit Priest Admits Molesting Youth

Molest cases at Berlin’s Canisius College Jesuit high school, where “systematic” sexual abuse took place for years.

A priest last week admitted in a statement to SPIEGEL he had abused a number of pupils at an elite Berlin high school run by Jesuit priests. In recent days, around 20 former students have come forward alleging they were sexually abused by priests at the school. The director of Canisius College has described the years-long abuse as “systematic.”

Berlin’s Canisius College, a university-prep high school run by Jesuit priests, is one of the most elite schools in the German capital. Former students from the respected private school have reached the upper echelons of business, politics and society. For the past week, however, Canisius College has been at the center of a major sexual abuse scandall.

Last week, around 20 former students claimed they had been sexually abused by two teachers at the school, Wolfgang S. and Peter R. The abuse is believed to have been committed during the 1970s and 1980s.

‘Nothing To Apologize For’

After being contacted by SPIEGEL, one of the former teachers admitted he had abused some of his students. Wolfgang S., a former sports teacher and Jesuit priest, issued a statement to his victims stating it was “a sad fact that I abused children and young men under pseudo-educational pretexts.” The churchman, who today lives in South America, said that he had informed regional Catholic authorities in Germany in 1991 of his “criminal past.” He claims the Jesuit priests had known for 19 years about the multiple incidents of abuse.

Stefan Dartmann, the Catholic Provincial Superior for Germany, confirmed to SPIEGEL that the order has knowledge of the crimes that had been committed by Wolfgang S. at the time. Dartmann said a lawyer had been hired to investigate the files “to determine what, exactly, the Jesuits knew at the time and what consequences they drew.” Wolfgang S. left the order in 1992. Previously, he is also believed to have abused pupils at other schools, but he refused to comment on those allegations.

In addition to his time at the Berlin school, he worked at the Sankt-Ansgar School in Hamburg and at the Sankt-Blasien school in the southern Black Forest region from 1982 to 1984.

‘Intimate, Fatherly Behavior’

The then-director of the school, Father Hans Joachim Martin, said that S.’s “intimate, fatherly behavior” towards some schoolchildren had attracted his attention. S. was later forced to leave the high school.

S. also claimed he had told the Vatican about his misconduct. In his statement, he says that he had provided testimony to the Vatican with “unvarnished honesty.” And in South America, he had “again and again come into close contact with the torturers and victims” of the Pinochet dictatorship. “I was confronted with my mirror image as a tormenter of children,” he said.

Several victims expressed their outrage over the tone of his statement. In the document, dated Jan. 20, S. addressed “all the people who I abused as children and in their youth.” He added, “I’m sorry for what I did to you. And if you are capable, I ask you to forgive me.” But he also told SPIEGEL: “I have come clean about my past to God and the world.”

The second man alleged to have abused children at the school is a 69-year-old former religion teacher from Berlin, Peter R., who has disputed all allegations. SPIEGEL could not reach R. for comment by press time on Friday or on subsequent attempts on Monday. After his time at the school in Berlin, R. apparently worked as a pastor with young people in the state of Lower Saxony. He was reportedly the victim of a knife attack by a former Canisius College student several years ago.

Victim: Priest Ordered Me to Masturbate in Front of Him

After SPIEGEL hit the newsstands on Monday, additional details emerged in the alleged abuses.

One former victim who has accused Peter R. told SPIEGEL that he had had “several extensive talks” in 1981 with the school’s rector at the time, in which he spoke exhaustively about his sexual abuse. He said the abuse had taken place in a basement on the school grounds. He said the priest had repeatedly ordered him to masturbate in front of him. “Anyone who wanted to get any further in school,” the witness said, was forced to go through similar degradation.

Karl Heinz Fischer, the school’s rector from April 1981 to June 1989, confirmed to SPIEGEL that a student had reported Peter R.’s abuse to him during the first half of 1981. Fischer said he had immediately notified his superior, priest Rolf Dieter Pfahl, who was the Provincial Superior for the Jesuit Province of Northern Germany, of the allegations. Pfahl then called for Peter R. to be transferred. After the summer holidays in 1981, Fischer told SPIEGEL, Peter R. was no longer deployed in the classroom.

Pope Benedict XVI Summons Irish Bishops Over Child Abuse Scandal

January 20, 2010 by Infinite

Three decades? Sounds like the most horrible cult that ever existed.

And let’s not forget that the Roman Catholic Church has done much, much worse things in the past.

(AFP) — Pope Benedict XVI has summoned Irish bishops to the Vatican for a meeting next month over a child sex abuse scandal that has shaken Ireland, a spokesman said Wednesday.

“The meeting comes in the context of the problems in the Irish Church,” Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi told AFP, referring to revelations that Roman Catholic authorities in Ireland concealed abuse of children by priests for three decades.

Vatican declares unique copyright on Papal figure

December 28, 2009 by Infinite

Hilarious!

Pope Benedict XVI

Vatican City, Dec 19, 2009 / 12:23 pm (CNA).- The Vatican made a declaration on the protection of the figure of the Pope on Saturday morning. The statement seeks to establish and safeguard the name, image and any symbols of the Pope as being expressly for official use of the Holy See unless otherwise authorized.

The statement cited a “great increase of affection and esteem for the person of the Holy Father” in recent years as contributing to a desire to use the Pontiff’s name for all manner of educational and cultural institutions, civic groups and foundations.

Due to this demand, the Vatican has felt it necessary to declare that “it alone has the right to ensure the respect due to the Successors of Peter, and therefore, to protect the figure and personal identity of the Pope from the unauthorized use of his name and/or the papal coat of arms for ends and activities which have little or nothing to do with the Catholic Church.”

The declaration alludes to attempts to use ecclesiastical or pontifical symbols and logos to “attribute credibility and authority to initiatives” as another reason to establish their “copyright” on the Holy Father’s name, picture and coat of arms.

“Consequently, the use of anything referring directly to the person or office of the Supreme Pontiff… and/or the use of the title ‘Pontifical,’ must receive previous and express authorization from the Holy See,” concluded the message released to the press.

Source: Catholic News Agency

Irish Catholic Bishops Resign Over Church Cover-Up of Child Abuse

December 27, 2009 by Infinite

Dublin Bishops Eamonn Walsh and Ray Field issue joint statement announcing their resignation in wake of damning investigation

Two Roman Catholic bishops in Ireland resigned on Christmas day in the wake of a damning investigation into decades of church cover-up of child abuse in the Dublin archdiocese.

Dublin Bishops Eamonn Walsh and Ray Field offered an apology to child-abuse victims as they announced their resignation during Christmas mass. Priests read the statement to worshippers throughout the archdiocese, home to a quarter of Ireland’s 4 million Catholics.

Earlier this month two other bishops, Donal Murray of Limerick and Jim Moriarty of Kildare, resigned following the publication on 26 November of a three-year investigation into why so many abusive Dublin priests escaped justice for so long.

The government-ordered investigation found that Dublin church leaders spent decades shielding more than 170 paedophile priests from the law. They began providing information to police only in 1995 – but continued to keep secret, until 2004, many files and other records of reported abuse.

In a joint statement Walsh and Field said they hoped their resignations “may help to bring the peace and reconciliation of Jesus Christ to the victims (and) survivors of child sexual abuse. We again apologise to them.”

80 new cases of child abuse by Catholic priests in Ireland: Inquiry

November 29, 2009November 29, 2009 by Infinite

“What You Have Done Unto The Least of These, You Have Done Unto Me”

What you have done unto these children, you have done unto me.

The Catholic church abused, raped and murdered people through all the centuries.

Why are you still giving your power and your children away to those criminals?

“Ye shall know them by their fruits.”

… or by their (hand-) signs …

Pope Benedict XVI remained silent over the devastating abuse report

Eighty files are to be sent to the Republic’s Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) by a garda team investigating fresh complaints of clerical child abuse.

The complaints were made after publication in May of the Ryan report, which detailed horrific physical and sexual abuse perpetrated by members of religious orders.

The revelation comes as gardai turn their attention to investigating priests in the Dublin Archdiocese who are the subject of the Murphy report, which was published this week.

Bishops who served in the Dublin Archdiocese while children were being sexually abused were desperately resisting calls for their resignations last night.

Pope Benedict XVI remained silent over the devastating abuse report, which accused the Church of “denial, arrogance and cover-up”, with survivors saying there was no regard within the Catholic Church for child welfare.

The Pope’s representative in Ireland gave an assurance to the Irish public that Pope Benedict was committed to rooting paedophile priests from the ranks of the Irish clergy.

Supreme Court Refuses to Block Release of Catholic Church Sex Abuse Papers

October 6, 2009 by Infinite

In all of history the Catholic Church was more like a whorehouse and a place of abuse and rape then a place of contemplation and that is documented and proven.

“And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

Whenever the truth (‘Teachings of the masters of all ages’) got lost those left behind created a religion and as always those in positions of power abused their power.

The masses never really understood things like:
“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in me (Not Jesus, but the Christ, which is a very high level of consciousness that can be attained by each human being), the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go to the Father.”

People could do greater works than Jesus, when he had reached ‘Christ Consciousness’, but instead people chose to be the sheep of outdated, backward, criminal institutions like the Roman Catholic Church.

If you are happy worshiping, then you will never become a master. Never.

If people never take responsibility for their entire life, then they will always be victims.

Jeshuah ben Joseph (Jesus) is just one of many masters that have walked the face of the earth. From most of them you haven’t even heard their names.

The following books are not about religion, sects, cults, gurus or new age channels:
– Life and Teaching of the Masters of the Far East, Vol. 1 Price: $8.76
– Life and Teaching of the Masters of the Far East, Vol. 2 Price: $10.95
– Life and Teaching of the Masters of the Far East, Vol. 3 Price: $10.95
In German:
– Leben und Lehren der Meister in Fernen Osten. Band 1-3 Preis: EUR 12,95

Proof that miraculous abilities are indeed real:
– China’s Super Psychics (At the moment this book (in English) is only available at ridiculous prices.)
In German:
– Indigo-Schulen: Trainingsmethoden für medial begabte Kinder Preis: EUR 8,95

The German title is complete BS.

‘Super Psychics’ is a lot better, but would you have guessed that this includes healing abilities, teleportation, biolocation and manifesting out of thin air etc.?

My Tai Chi and Qi Gong teachers can also do the miraculous. (For them it’s normal and everybody could do it in their eyes.)

But since they don’t want to be publicly known, here are some great YouTube videos:
– Ling Kong Jing (Empty Force) Demo by Master Shr on Bill Moyers Special
– Qigong master (Realy cool Must see! ): (This master appears to be mentally unstable but he has great abilities.)
– Qigong Master Boils Water With His Hands Pyrokinesis

True power, greatness, love, freedom and happiness wait to be found within yourself.

The justices on Monday turned down a request by the Roman Catholic diocese in Bridgeport, Conn.

Catholic Scouting (Source: Diocese of Bridgeport)

The Supreme Court has refused to block the release of documents generated by lawsuits against priests in Connecticut for alleged sexual abuse.

The justices on Monday turned down a request by the Roman Catholic diocese in Bridgeport, Conn.

Several newspapers are seeking the release of more than 12,000 pages from 23 lawsuits against six priests.

The records have been under seal since the diocese settled the cases in 2001. Courts in Connecticut have ruled that the papers should be made public.

The high court also refused to make a decision Monday on whether to hear arguments from a group of Chinese men who have been imprisoned at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp for more than seven years.

The justices reviewed the case last week, but made no announcement about how they will move on the petition from the Uighurs — whose relocation has been part of a larger headache for the Obama administration, which is trying to meet its self-imposed pledge to close Gitmo by January.

Pope Benedict XVI Calls for NEW FINANCIAL ORDER With ‘Real Teeth’

July 7, 2009 by Infinite

A New World Order … but, but, but that ‘was’ only a conspiracy on the internet. Wake up!

‘Blessed are those who have eyes to see and ears to hear.’

pope_ratzinger_handsign2-20-09

July 7 (Bloomberg) — Pope Benedict XVI called for a new financial order with “real teeth” as Group of Eight leaders prepare to discuss ways out of the worst recession since World War II.

“Profit is useful if it serves as a means toward an end,” he wrote in a letter to Catholic bishops worldwide published today. “Once profit becomes the exclusive goal, if it is produced by improper means and without the common good as its ultimate end, it risks destroying wealth and creating poverty.” The 150-page encyclical, the third of his papacy, is titled “Caritas in Veritate” in Latin, or “charity in truth.”

The pope’s reflections on capitalism were two years in the making and publication was held up when the credit crunch crippled the world economy. Benedict said last month the crisis shows “how the economic and financial paradigms that have been dominant in recent years must be rethought.”

The German-born pontiff touched on many themes that will be discussed by the leaders of the largest economies, including “protection of the environment.” He called for a “reform of the United Nations, economic institutions and international finance so the idea of the family of nations can acquire real teeth.”

Meeting Obama

obama

The pope will have his first meeting with President Barack Obama at the end of the three-day summit, which starts tomorrow in L’Aquila, Italy. He received Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso at the Vatican today, while Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi will meet tonight with his Japanese counterpart to discuss the G-8 agenda and the financial crisis.

berlusconi-sign

Benedict, the head of the world’s smallest state, also spoke out in his encyclical on globalization’s benefits and risks.

Final report: Endemic rape and abuse of more than 30.000 Irish children in Catholic care

May 20, 2009 by Infinite

Beatings and humiliation by nuns and priests were common at institutions that held up to 30,000 children, Ryan report states

Henry McDonald on the long-awaited report on abuse in Ireland’s schools

Rape and sexual molestation were “endemic” in Irish Catholic church-run industrial schools and orphanages, a report revealed today.

The nine-year investigation found that Catholic priests and nuns for decades terrorised thousands of boys and girls in the Irish Republic, while government inspectors failed to stop the chronic beatings, rape and humiliation.

The high court judge Sean Ryan today unveiled the 2,600-page final report of Ireland’s commission into child abuse, which drew on testimony from thousands of former inmates and officials from more than 250 church-run institutions. Police were called to the news conference amid angry scenes as victims were prevented from attending.

More than 30,000 children deemed to be petty thieves, truants or from dysfunctional families – a category that often included unmarried mothers – were sent to Ireland’s austere network of industrial schools, reformatories, orphanages and hostels from the 1930s until the last facilities shut in the 1990s.

Dublin archbishop: Sex abuse report will shock

December 2, 2017April 10, 2009 by Infinite

And how many were abused since the dark ages? This report did not shock me at all. Such behavior can be considered “normal” within the Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church also killed millions of innocent people in the name of Christ.

He says it will show that thousands of youths were abused from 1975-2004

DUBLIN – The Archbishop of Dublin said Thursday that an upcoming report on child sexual abuse involving Catholic priests will likely reveal that thousands of youngsters were abused from 1975 to 2004.

The report “will shock us all,” said Diarmuid Martin, during Mass at Dublin’s Pro-Cathedral.

The archbishop said the report, compiled by the Dublin Archdiocese Commission of Investigation, is expected to show that “thousands of children or young people across Ireland were abused by priests in the period under investigation and the horror of that abuse was not recognized for what it is.”

The government-appointed commission was set up to investigate abuses within the Dublin archdiocese in 2006, the same year the diocese admitted that up to 102 of its priests were suspected of abusing children. The report is studying how complaints of child sexual abuse were handled.

The commission has also now begun an investigation into the Diocese of Cloyne, in County Cork. Commission member Ita Mangan said that could potentially delay the publication of the Dublin report which had been planned for this summer.

Pope Reinstates Four Excommunicated Bishops

January 25, 2009January 25, 2009 by Infinite

“Among the men reinstated Saturday was Richard Williamson, a British-born cleric who in an interview last week said he did not believe that six million Jews died in the Nazi gas chambers. He has also given interviews saying that the United States government staged the Sept. 11 attacks as a pretext to invade Afghanistan.”

VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI, reaching out to the far-right of the Roman Catholic Church, revoked the excommunications of four schismatic bishops on Saturday, including one whose comments denying the Holocaust have provoked outrage.

Richard Williamson, one of the bishops, during a TV interview.

The decision provided fresh fuel for critics who charge that Benedict’s four-year-old papacy has increasingly moved in line with traditionalists who are hostile to the sweeping reforms of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s that sought to create a more modern and open church.

Related article: Pope stirs up Jewish fury over bishop (Guardian)

A theologian who has grappled with the church’s diminished status in a secular world, Benedict has sought to foster a more ardent, if smaller, church over one with looser faith.

Sept. 11, 1822: Church Admits It’s Not All About Us

September 11, 2008 by Infinite

Galileo Galilei, Italian mathematician, astronomer and physicist, was condemned for heresy by the the Roman Inquisition in 1633. He spent the last eight years of his life under house arrest.
Painting: Joseph Nicolas Robert-Fleury (1797-1890)/Bettmann Corbis

1822: The College of Cardinals finally caves in to the hard facts of science, saying that the “publication of works treating of the motion of the Earth and the stability of the sun, in accordance with the opinion of modern astronomers, is permitted.”

It represented a major shift in dogma for the Catholic Church, a concession that the Earth, in fact, might revolve around the sun. Unfortunately, it came 189 years too late to do Galileo Galilei any good.

Still, it would take another 13 years, until 1835, before Galileo’s Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems — the work in which he defends the heliocentric theory — would be removed from the Vatican’s list of banned books.

India: where Christians are a target for the religious murder mobs

December 12, 2008September 7, 2008 by Infinite

Namrata, a young Christian villager who was injured in an attack by a Hindu mob

The mob appeared an hour after sunset, armed with axes, clubs and paraffin. The carnage that followed would have been much worse if the Christians of Gadragaon, a remote village in northeast India, had not been warned by text message: “The Hindus are coming to kill you.”

The alert gave most enough time to flee to the jungle, where 114 of them would hide for a week, drinking rainwater and foraging for food.

But the warning did not come early enough for those unable to run. “They doused him with petrol and taunted him; we could hear him screaming,” said Ravindra Nath Prahan, 45, of his paralysed brother, Rasananda, 35, who was burnt alive by Hindu fanatics. “I could have tried to save him. But we had to save ourselves.”

Knights Templar heirs in legal battle with the Pope

August 4, 2008August 4, 2008 by Infinite

The heirs of the Knights Templar have launched a legal battle in Spain to force the Pope to restore the reputation of the disgraced order which was accused of heresy and dissolved seven centuries ago.

Jacques de Molay, the 23rd and Last Grand Master of the Knights Templar, is lead to the stake to burn for heresy Photo: GETTY

The Association of the Sovereign Order of the Temple of Christ, whose members claim to be descended from the legendary crusaders, have filed a lawsuit against Benedict XVI calling for him to recognise the seizure of assets worth 100 billion euros (£79 billion).

Weak dollar sends Vatican into the red

July 12, 2008 by Infinite

The Vatican has blamed a weak dollar for pushing it into its first loss in four years by undermining the value of dollar-denominated donations by the faithful.

Annual accounts published this week show the Holy See fell into the red last year, recording a loss of €9.1m (£7.25m).

The US currency has fallen sharply against the euro since the start of last year, hitting the Holy See in the pocket as its expenses are incurred in euros. Much of the Vatican’s income comes from donations by Catholics around the world. The US was the largest single contributor to Peter’s Pence – the collection used by the Pope for charitable donations – sending almost $19m (£9.5m).

But the shortfall attributed mainly to the weak dollar was mitigated by a rise of €4m in property income. The Holy See is a major owner of property all over Rome and was criticised last year for raising rents and threatening to evict tenants.

Earlier this year, the Vatican released a new list of mortal sins which included “accumulating excessive wealth”. (Then the Catholic Church will go to hell for sure. Maybe the Holy See needs a divine bailout one day. – The Infinite Unknown)

McCain Backer Hagee Said Hitler Was Fulfilling God’s Will (AUDIO)

May 21, 2008 by Infinite

John Hagee, the controversial evangelical leader and endorser of Sen. John McCain, argued in a late 1990s sermon that the Nazis had operated on God’s behalf to chase the Jews from Europe and shepherd them to Palestine. According to the Reverend, Adolph Hitler was a “hunter,” sent by God, who was tasked with expediting God’s will of having the Jews re-establish a state of Israel.

Going in and out of biblical verse, Hagee preached: “‘And they the hunters should hunt them,’ that will be the Jews. ‘From every mountain and from every hill and from out of the holes of the rocks.’ If that doesn’t describe what Hitler did in the holocaust you can’t see that.”

He goes on: “Theodore Hertzel is the father of Zionism. He was a Jew who at the turn of the 19th century said, this land is our land, God wants us to live there. So he went to the Jews of Europe and said ‘I want you to come and join me in the land of Israel.’ So few went that Hertzel went into depression. Those who came founded Israel; those who did not went through the hell of the holocaust.

“Then god sent a hunter. A hunter is someone with a gun and he forces you. Hitler was a hunter. And the Bible says — Jeremiah writing — ‘They shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and from the holes of the rocks,’ meaning there’s no place to hide. And that might be offensive to some people but don’t let your heart be offended. I didn’t write it, Jeremiah wrote it. It was the truth and it is the truth. How did it happen? Because God allowed it to happen. Why did it happen? Because God said my top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel.” (Listen to the audio below.)

The sermon, which was first posted by Bruce Wilson on his site, Talk To Action, adds another element to Hagee’s controversial stance on the state and history of Israel. It also may provide a new round of political headaches for McCain who has admitted that seeking out Hagee’s endorsement was a mistake, but still declared himself “glad to have” it.

John Hagee’s Ministries did not immediately return request for comment.

Since McCain secured the endorsement, both his campaign and Hagee have been pressed to explain a series of derogatory remarks the Reverend made about the Catholic Church, including his reference to the institution as “the Great Whore.”

Hagee has since apologized for those remarks. But his interpretation of the role of the Nazis could be harder to dismiss, in part because McCain and Sen. Barack Obama are expected to compete heavily over the Jewish vote come the general election, in part because McCain has said he admires Hagee’s commitment to Israel, but mainly because similar theories have found their way into much of the Reverend’s writings.

As Wilson notes, in his 2006 book “Jerusalem Countdown”, Hagee proposed the theory that “anti-Semitism, and thus the Holocaust, was the fault of Jews themselves — the result of an age old divine curse incurred by the ancient Hebrews through worshiping idols and passed, down the ages, to all Jews now alive.” He also wrote that “Most readers will be shocked by the clear record of history linking Adolf Hitler and the Roman Catholic Church in a conspiracy to exterminate the Jews.”

Hagee is considered, in many political circles, to be one of the most passionate and strident supporters of Israel. He has spoken at AIPAC conferences and leads the evangelical group Christians United for Israel. But his views of the country, while possibly shared by others in the evangelical community, can be, at times, startling. Holding to the belief that Armageddon will come to earth following the reestablishment of the Kingdom of Israel, Hagee has advocated an aggressive war against Iran and has opposed any Israeli military withdrawal from the West Bank.

McCain, at least in the public record, has sought to thread the needle with the Hagee association: distancing himself from the controversial comment while reaping the political benefits of the Reverend’s endorsement. Appearing on ABC’s “‘This Week” in late April 2008, McCain criticized Hagee’s past remarks on the Catholic Church, but said that, “I admire and appreciate his advocacy for the state of Israel, the independence of the state of Israel.”

May 21, 2008 01:24 PM

Source: The Huffington Post