Cassandra Strikes Again!

Pity, Cassandra that no one believed you

But then again you were lost from the start

Now we must suffer and sell our secrets

Bargain, playing smart, aching in our hearts

Sorry Cassandra I misunderstood

now the last day is dawning

Some of us wanted but none of us would

listen to words of warning

From the ABBA song, Cassandra

Read the complete article by Cassandra Jones on spero news here.

Legion of Christ delays explanation of Rev. Maciel

More than a month has passed since revelations that the Legion of Christ's founder, Rev. Marcial Maciel, may have fathered a child, the LC appears to delay a response due to an internal debate over its "charism." He is also accused of paedophilia.

More than a month has now passed since the February 3 revelation that Rev. Marcial Maciel, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, fathered a daughter. The Legionaries immediately admitted it officially and claimed to be surprised at the discovery of inconsistencies in their founder’s life. But this was only a provisional response that avoided specifics out of concerns for privacy and suggested that a fuller accounting was being prepared. That fuller accounting is now delayed and the reasons why are emerging. Church officials must reconcile two divergent views on the question whether the Legionaries have a “charism” and a “mission” given to them by God and already acknowledged by the Church.

A promise of “materials to inform the Church and the public about all of this” was first made on February 13 by Rev. Owen Kearns, publisher of the Legionary National Catholic Register. Some inside the Legion and the Vatican expected these to be issued on February 24 and the Catholic News Agency was told so.

The statement could be expected to address specifics, at least in general terms: Was the daughter’s mother a “mistress” or was the child conceived in an act of statutory rape, another instance of Father Maciel’s pedophilia? Is there another child? Was money embezzled or misused? Is Father Maciel’s sexual abuse of his seminarians now officially admitted to? Will Father Maciel’s public accusers, whom the Legion calumniated for years, be acknowledged and apologized to? What are the consequences of Father Maciel’s sins on the life of his institute?

These questions are painful enough for the Legionaries to answer honestly, especially since for 12 years in public they only ever defended their Founder with untruth and evasion. But the statement would also begin to lay out for the order a path on which to continue in a post-scandal future and that will need the approval of Catholic Church authorities. The Church will not now allow the order to decide its future entirely on its own.