On March 30, I posted a comment about the Murphy abuse case and the NYT’s article accusing Pope Benedict of having stopped the priest’s trial. The trial judge, Fr. Thomas Brundage, has now issued a correction of an erroneous statement he made last week, so I have updated my commentary with the additional information. His defense of the Pope’s reputation remains unchanged.
Jason Berry follows the money to Rome
UPDATE: Currently reading Berry’s piece. Was heartened by Berry’s following admission, given his past criticism of Cardinal Ratzinger’s handling of the Maciel case (prior to Cardinal Ratzinger being elected Pope):
One cardinal who rebuffed a Legion financial gift was Joseph Ratzinger.
In 1997 he gave a lecture on theology to Legionaries. When a Legionary handed him an envelope, saying it was for his charitable use, Ratzinger refused. “He was tough as nails in a very cordial way,” a witness said.
Good for His Holiness. And good for Jason Berry for showing journalistic integrity in pointing this out.
*******
Jason Berry’s first installment of a two-part series investigating Legion of Christ finances was published today. You can read the article by clicking here. For those new to this whole controversy, Jason Berry is one of two Hartford Courant journalists who in 1997 broke the story of Maciel’s sex abuse of minor seminarians. This afternoon has been pretty busy so I have not yet had time to read his latest expose. But Giselle has posted some comments here.
Pope John Paul II, Medjugorje and Marcial Maciel
Patrick Madrid has blogged an excellent post discussing Medjugorje, Marcial Maciel and Pope John Paul II’s (alleged in the case of Medjugorje) support of these two ecclesiastical movements. To read it, please click here.
St. Maximos on the Resurrection
“The Logos destroys the tyranny of the evil one, who dominates us through deceit, by triumphantly using as a weapon against him the flesh defeated in Adam. In this way he shows that what was once captured and made subject to death now captures the captor: by a natural death it destroys the captor’s life and becomes a poison to him, making him vomit up all those he was able to swallow because he had the power of death. But to humankind it becomes life, like leaven in the dough impelling the whole of nature to rise like dough in the resurrection of life (cf. 1 Cor 5:6-7). It was to confer this life that the Logos who was God became man – a truly unheard of thing – and willingly accepted the death of the flesh.” – St. Maximos the Confessor.
Christ is risen!
Here’s what our parish will be singing at sunrise: