Please stay tuned to this very important action item today.
The National Catholic Register has picked up the righteous efforts of Catholics. I applaud them for their leadership and integrity. I hope other Catholics will join our efforts.
Bishop Kicanas is on the record saying ordaining seminarians who rape children would be a 'gross injustice', that raping children is some kind of kink in somebody's sexual maturity that would work itself out and there was nothing he could have done any differently.
His history disqualifies him for any type of leadership position going forward. He should have the decency to acknowledge this and recuse himself.
If the Bishops go forward to elect him, there is going to be an well-organized campaign to de-fund "Bishops' Annual Appeals" nationally - starting in Boston.
Nothing has changed about the dynamic of writing letters to Bishops about scandals which they ignore and throw into the trash. A concerted effort by Catholics of good will to contact their Bishop and let know the people in the pews will hold them accountable as a body of bishops for any majority vote that elects Bishop Kicanas and the de-fundings shall commence in 2011.
The message they would send by electing Bp. Kicinas would be a terrible blow to the trust of Catholics who have believed in their sincerity. This election would be a mockery to that trust and we must do everything we can to stop it.
***UPDATE
GETTING VERY INTERESTING OUT THERE...
Commonheal Magazine has posted a response to Catholic outrage of the pederast enabler that gives some insight into how the Paul Shanley's of the Catholic Church were protected for so long. Conservatives vs. Bishop Kicanas.
When pedophiles or pedophile enablers are lurking, the doctrinal compass somehow comes into play and if anyone on any side of scandal is doctrinally sound, they circle the pedophile and/or their enablers to protect them.
Paul Shanley was a big hit with the Catholics who wanted to "change the teachings of the Church" until they wanted to swing like a monkey to dethrone a Cardinal who was keeping dissent from flourishing.
The Commonweal folks actually lie to cover up the scandal. Check this out:
In 2007, Kicanas told the Chicago Sun-Times that he was aware of three allegations of “sexual improprieties” against McCormack, but that they were not “credible,” therefore it would have been unjust to deny him ordination.Kicanas' conclusion was not at all that the three allegations were not credible. Kicanas in fact said that the sex with children was a glitch in his sexual development that he thought would work itself out. He referred to it as "activity". Kicanas concluded the sex with children indeed did happen:
“There was a sense that his activity was part of the developmental process and that he had learned from the experience,” Kicanas explained... ”I don’t think there was anything I could have done differently.”When you look back over 23 victims and can still say pedophiles just need time to develop and there's nothing that he could have done differently, the discretion of this man would bring outrage from lovers of children and justice.
My experiences over the past two weeks is that this is sadly not the case.
Curiously, rather than look at the quackery of Bishop Kicanas, they bring the claim that Cardinal George did not accept an interim recommendation that the priest be removed from ministry which is true and this is disturbing but the record shows that they did not give the evidence to Cardinal George. Even if this were not the case, Cardinal George is not on record saying pedophile perversion is experimentation that works itself out and he doesn't see what should have been done differently.
David Gibson actually goes on in the comments section to imply the journalist who expressed concern at the National Catholic Register is some kind of nefarious pedophile enabler:
The moral of the story is prelates can get away with anything so long as the person raising a concern is viewed as orthodox.