-- Christina (introibo2000@yahoo.com), March 06, 2002.
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I have had the book for several years and was about to start reading it. Did he write any other books after The Keys Of This Blood ? Don
-- Don Scott (donscott@myexcel.ca), June 23, 2003.
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Just a few thoughts on MM, and the state of the Church...
I've read so far The Jesuits, Hostage to the Devil, Windswept House, and am currently reading The Keys of This Blood. Through all of this reading I have certainly come to at least two conclusions about Fr. Malachi - that he was NOT a crackpot, and that he had great, great love for the Church. I have never read anything in his writings that goes against Church doctrines. He did leave the Jesuit order, but remained a functional priest in good standing (he left his vow of chastity intact, with the permission of Paul VI).
I started with Windswept House - a fictional book that Fr. Malachi claimed is 80% true. The book was written in the 90's - several years before the current scandals came out - before anyone could imagine the scope of the rot. It was all there in the book - the abuse and the homosexual networks. There may be those reading this that don't want to dig up scandals. The unfortunate thing is that if you don't look at these scandals squarely and know all about them, you won't really understand just how little the bishops in this country (or other countries) are doing to correct the problem, or even that they continue to perpetuate the problem.
I would like to interject at this point that I strongly recommend going to www.rcf.org. This website is run by a watchdog group in Illinois (lay people and religious working together) that was formed in response to scandals that happened in their diocese(though their membership is now worldwide). They are extremely circumspect in their investigations, very good at documentation. Whatever you've read in the papers (including the Register, which IMHO deliberately whitewashes the scandals) is the tip of the iceburg compared to what you will learn on this website. There is great reason to distrust bishops - but all I ask is for you to give the website a good read and decide for yourself. And then decide, after what you learn, if you can afford not to know the depth of what is happening in your Church.
I do not like criticizing bishops, but think for a moment. While bishops issue statements about the evils of abortion, they give communion to senators who rabidly advocate for it, even partial-birth abortion. Bishop Weigand spoke out against Gray Davis. I was so happy to see a bishop finally speak out against a pro- abortion "catholic" politician - until I read in the Register that it's just talk. There will be no follow up like, say, excommunication, if Davis doesn't clean up his act. If you read Crisi magazine, they are doing a series on this very issue, and THEY have called into question why bishops do NOTHING.
Fr. Malachi, in his book The Jesuits, gives a great historical foundation for why there is a great deal of disobedience in the hierarchy to the Pope and Catholic moral teaching in general. There are reasons why churches no longer have kneelers, or beautiful and meaningful icons/windows/sanctuaries. There are reasons why crosses are thrown into the dumpster (there are pictures of this on rcf's website), and that devotions such as to the Sacred Heart of Jesus are not only not observed but are scorned - by clergy! There are reasons why churches have been closed and razed to the ground. This isn't fundamentalist conspiracy whining - these things are happening! All symptoms of the moral rot of our leaders, and that has spread to the laity.
I grew up post-Vatican II. I wasn't someone who first-hand saw the differences of before and after. But my family suffered from an abusive priest and the cover-up afterward. A lot of the things Fr. Malachi has written about makes sense of a lot of the questions I had like -"How could things get THIS bad? How can a priest/bishop/cardinal/pope (yes I said Pope) turn his head when his fellow priest is abusing children or breaking his vows of chastity with other gay priests?" Because of RCF, and Fr. Malachi, I sadly understand so much more what has happened and continues to happen.
I'm sorry to go on so long, but Catholics need to know these things about their leaders. Perhaps Fr. Malachi was not right about everything he postulated, but he has been right about a great many things from what I've seen and read.
Thaks for reading, Deb
-- Deborah Sullivan (jsulmom@juno.com), August 06, 2003.
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Hi Deborah; I'm with you all the way.
Get ready to get skewered, though... people 'round these parts don' take too kindly t' such reckonin's, if you know what I mean. There's a stubborn refusal to take stock of the gravity of our situation in the Church. Somehow they come to the conclusion that to consider such things is a denial of our Holy Faith; I haven't been able to pursuade them otherwise.
Godspeed! lol.
Oh btw, I have always thought it odd that after so many decades that the proposed text of the Third Secret of Fatima was released roughly a month after Malachi's death. You see, Malachi Martin knew the contents of the text.
-- Emerald (emerald1@cox.net), August 06, 2003.
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Thanks Emerald,
One more thing I'd like to clarify. I have very mixed feelings about our Pope. I know he has done incredibly good and brave things for our faith, and I know he has not done anything to try to change Catholic moral teaching, but I also know there are certain things he neglected. I am at a total loss to figure out why - that's one of the reasons I've been reading so much of Fr. Malachi. He seemed to have the same attitude - great admiration and love for the Pope, and yet sad puzzlement over why he seemed to be ignoring certain Church problems. In my perusal of RCF's website, I've come to know that the Vatican knew much about sexual abuses for many years. I don't see how the Pope could have failed to know, and thus could have failed to act. I've been to one or two other Catholic chat rooms, but the answers offered by site moderators have been far from satisfactory.
And now, there is the news story about how highly placed Vatican officials wrote a document about how to secretly handle abuse cases. I'm curious to know how the bishops explain their initial reaction that the document has been 'taken out of context.' Not theat the press doesn't take things out of context all the time, especially where the Catholic Church is concerned (I've at times been an avid reader of The Catalyst, and I know what the press is capable of). It's just that after my readings and other observations, I'm not too hopeful about their explanation being true.
Anyway, I do hope that no one thinks I am trying to take down the faith. If anything, I am more determined than ever that the devil not turn me away from it through these scandals - that is what he is hoping for, after all. But one can't just close one's eyes to what is going on, because then how does one fight it? I say again, the depth of the problem must be known by all Catholics if we are to have a hope of restoring what has gone bad. Just one example before I go; When Bishop O'Malley was inducted into his new position in Boston this past week, I was outside with about 10 other people holding signs questioning why pro-abortion 'catholic' politicians were invited and given communion (Teddy Kennedy and John F. Kerry, in case you're wondering). There were only about 10 of us! Why? There should have been hundreds, if we take our faith seriously.
Well, that's it for now. Have a good night, all.
Deb Sullivan
-- Deb Sullivan (jsulmom@juno.com), August 07, 2003.
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"Anyway, I do hope that no one thinks I am trying to take down the faith."
They will, but I can't stop them; but hey, I know that you aren't doing that.
"If anything, I am more determined than ever that the devil not turn me away from it through these scandals - that is what he is hoping for, after all."
Exactly. Or worse yet, he likes to have people denying the problems exist, because...
"...one can't just close one's eyes to what is going on, because then how does one fight it?"
Prayer and penance.
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