Tag Archives: suicide

“Pray for me, that I may not flee for fear of the wolves.”

Pope Benedict XVI on the day of his election

Let us pray for Benedict XVI, our Pope.

May the Lord preserve him, and give him life, and make him blessed upon the earth, and deliver him not up to the will of his enemies. [Psalm 40,3 (41,3)]

O God, Shepherd and Ruler of all Thy faithful people, look mercifully upon Thy servant Benedict XVI, whom Thou hast chosen as shepherd to preside over Thy Church. Grant him, we beseech Thee, that by his word and example, he may edify those over whom he hath charge, so that together with the flock committed to him, may he attain everlasting life. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Our Father. Hail Mary. Glory be.

Don’t worry, Holy Father, we’re praying for you. Jesus, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, takes no prisoners among the wolves. He either converts them or kills them soul and body unto hell. To a wolf. To a man. Sure, He bears the scars, but He’s the only One left standing.

The wolves that the Holy Father is talking about are cowardly bishops (with adjunct chancery toadies), who, instead of hanging themselves as did Judas of old, are now going after their fellow priests, having them do the unthinkable instead of themselves.

There are good, holy, wonderfully Catholic Bishops and superb chancery offficials. I know some! I am sure that they join me in lamenting what is now about to happen in the Church: multitudinous suicides of priests, right around the globe.

At the time of the homosexualist Abuse Symposium at the Pontifical Gregorian University ealier this year, it was said that the Holy See is in the process of collecting policies on what to do with accusations of abuse from every diocese and eparchy around the world. The idea is to come up with something balanced for the entire Church. “Balanced” does not describe “The Judas Crisis” – Priests falsely accused and wrongly thrown out of the priesthood? Why? Follow the thirty pieces of silver – A HSH Special, a crisis which holds all priests to be guilty no matter what: ♬ “Kíll the priest! ♬ Kíll the priest! ♬ Kíll the chí-ld ráp-ing priest!” ♬ (Meet the cheerleader) A HSH Special

The presentations of the symposium were skewed in support of what, for instance, one finds with the American phenomenon called The National Catholic Risk Rentention Group (NCRRG). Cardinals, Archbishops and bishops own this entity, which creates policy on how to handle abuse cases in favor of saving money. That’s the policy: saving money. This has nothing to do with helping children. It has everything to do with having priests commit suicide, whether they are guilty or innocent, taking away all due process for the priests. The more who take their own lives, the better it is. That saves the most money of all. For an introduction, read this post with all the links: The Judas Crisis: NCRRG (Arch)Dioceses complicit in encouraging murder of priests? That will take you perhaps 45 minutes, but it is well worth the time, considering what is about to be visited upon the Church, which itself will pave the way for a world-wide persecution of all priests, because, if all the bishops of the Church do this to their own priests, why can’t everyone else?

Will what I say here be scandalous? Yes. Am I obliged to tell the truth nonetheless? Yes.

• Since, in order that the deceits of the enemy may be avoided, it is necessary  first of all that they be laid bare; since much is to be gained by  denouncing these fallacies for the sake of the unwary, even though We  prefer not to name these iniquities “as becometh saints,” yet for the  welfare of souls We cannot remain altogether silent.  – Pope Pius XI
• We’ve had enough of exhortations to be silent!  Cry out with a hundred  thousand tongues.  I see that the world is rotten because of silence! -  St. Catherine of Siena
• If people are scandalized at the Truth, it is better to allow the birth of scandal, than to abandon the Truth.  – Pope St. Gregory the Great
• Everyone who can speak the Truth, yet speaks it not, will be judged by God.  – St. Justin Martyr, died A.D. 165
• Anyone who conceals the Truth for fear of some authority calls down the wrath  of God upon himself, because he fears men more than God… Both are  guilty:  he who conceals the Truth and he who speaks falsehood, because  the former does not wish to make the Truth known and the latter desires  not to refute it. -  St. Augustine, died A.D. 430

But then there are other objections, such as this one:

• But Father! But Father! This doesn’t doesn’t have to do with doctrine or morals. This is about prudence, and it is a matter of opinion, in which case we follow what the bishops have to say, not you. So, shut your mouth!

That reminds me of the C.S. Lewis demonic character he called Screwtape, who gloated over the demonic character Wormwood’s human charge: “He doesn’t think of doctrines as primarily “true” of “false”, but as “academic” or “practical”, “outworn” or “contemporary”, “conventional” or “ruthless”.

This is a dark post. If you are too nice to be with Him who is Light, who shines in the darkness, if you are too nice to know about reality, click away. If you want to know what is fast going to become the greatest travesty of Judas Priests known in the entire history of the Church, read on. But be warned. This post will introduce you to what a priest who is innocent of an accusation, but is spiritually and/or psychologically ill-prepared for such a catastrophic event, can go through, until he commits suicide, as so many do… yes… even if they are innocent, especially if they are innocent.

[UPDATE: A most wonderful reader sent in this clip from A FEW GOOD MEN. Warning: There is some bad language. The Most memorable quote: "YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH"]

If you haven’t read the links above, it is advisable to do so now.

NOTA BENE: Readers of http://holysoulshermitage.com are aware that a close priest friend of mine committed suicide the other day. He was truly a good soul caught up in a swirl of neurological degeneration that was compounded by the faithlessness of others: here. But this is not the type of suicide committed by the priests whom I wish to discuss in this post. He was not an accused priest.

In this post, I wish to discuss the probability that even most priests who commit suicide after being accused are innocent of the crimes alleged against them, and that that doesn’t matter in the least to their fellow priests and bishops who set them up for this.

Father Gordon MacRae (About) has done a masterful job of writing about suicides of accused priests. He knows of dozens of cases. It is a heart rending account which he entitles “The Dark Night of the Priestly Soul.” I personally knew one of the priests who had committed suicide that Father MacRae mentions in that article. The total idiocy of the diocese encouraged the accused priest to head straight to a bridge, where he threw himself onto the Interstate Highway below. Surely an admission of guilt, right? I don’t know the details of that case, but I can say this: a suicide in such circumstances is not necessarily an admission of guilt. Not at all.

So, dear reader, let me remind you of a few things:

• Priests bear all the consequences of original sin like anyone else: weakness of mind, weakness of will, emotions that can be all over the place, sickness, death. Pretty much everyone treats priests as if this were not true. Those who would raise priests up on a false pedestal do a hateful thing, making life miserable for themselves and the priests. People who are having a hard time of their own false expectations for themselves like to project such agony onto others. There’s hardly anything sicker than this. The worst case of this happens when a priest goes in for “treatment”, and is told to deny his priesthood for the sake of being comfortable with not being on a pedestal any longer.  Who has the strength to bear such a cruel exercise in unreality, and it is precisely this which, for some, helps to make the priesthood a source of crime. It’s no different than psychological torture in a Soviet era Gulag. The false pedestal is actually heightened. This is a perverted view of the priesthood, hateful of the priesthood, and is a perspective one might find in, say, Silver Springs, Maryland.
• Almost no priest alive has had adequate spiritual formation in his seminary years, nor has tremendously progressed in the spiritual life since his ordination, to the end of being spiritually unflappable in the face of accusations, being able to humbly pray for the conversion of the false accusor and actually welcoming a loss of reputation and mistreatment by bishops, priests and laity as an occasion to know the beatitude of the Sum Total of the Beatitudes. Or did you really think that seminary formation has been perfect all these years? Really?
• Many priests, if not most, are politically correct, ladder climbing, sycophantic cowards, who, even if they were your friends before an accusation, will treat you as guilty along with everyone else and abandon you instantaneously, not listening to you, but running away from you with ears stopped, screaming. You would have never in your life guessed they would do something like this. And this most common experience among those who are accused  p r 0 v e s  beyond doubt just how devastating an accusation is to any priest, especially to the one who is accused, especially to the one who is accused falsely.
• Meanwhile, just think of it, if a priest was, in fact, guilty, wouldn’t he want the assistance of a priest to help him set things right with God and neighbor? That is also the thought of an innocent priest: “Just how monstrously un-Christian are these guys?”
• But, again, pretty much every priest runs away, not wanting to bother to get to know the truth of a situation, not caring if it is a theoretical impossibility to prove oneself innocent of “boundary issues”, not caring if they, the non-accused, hold themselves arrogantly aloof, lest they dirty themselves with facts, with truth, with justice, with integrity, with honesty. There is a reason why someone is not burdened with proving their innocence. It can’t be done. You are innocent until proven guilty. Except in this case. Everyone automatically holds you to be guilty of the worst crimes. Insisting on facts, truth, justice, integrity or honesty will make one look guilty!
• Think of it. Use your imagination: the second an accusation is made, one goes from happily serving the Lord’s little flock to being brought before a firing squad made up of money hungry bishops and priests, who you thought were your friends, but now have their guns trained  on you, and pull the trigger, riddling you with bullets, before you can say anything. You appeal for justice, due process. They shoot again. “But listen to me!” They shoot again. You’re dead. And they shout: “Damn you!” And then they gloat that they saved on attorney’s fees and any litigated claims, happy to have paid a mere settlement. To find out about how wagers are made on possible outcomes, read this brief post: The Judas Crisis $$$ — settlements vs litigation.
• Official policy upon an accusation is to remove the priest. O.K. But this is not, as the myth would suggest, only until an investigation confirms or discredits any allegations as due process respecting the rights of the accused is played out. Not at all. The procedure is merely giving control of the process to the accusor, who simply needs to name a price, which is then immediately paid. This is done preferably without lawyers, but that’s O.K. too. This all saves the diocese money, which is the point. The priest is sold by cowardly bishops and chancery toadies, who have prostituted themselves for money. And what is the priest, innocent of the allegations, to think of such Judas priests and bishops? Surely it must cross his mind that they are filthy Judas priests and bishops, whores of mammon, luxuriating in the thirty pieces of silver they throw over themselves much like a pig wallows in mud, grunting in glee.

• Meanwhile, the accused priest, who may well be innocent, faces dismissal from ministry, from the priesthood, and faces the threat of prison, regardless of any settlement, as more “memories” are brought forward and the jury is already criminally stacked against the accused priest by the fact of the settlement that has been made. In all of this, the allegations have nothing to do with anything. The only “proof of guilt” is the fact that the diocese settled the case, which, no matter how it is hyped, is an accusation of guilt by the diocese against the priest. Let’s review: the allegations are often not even considered. The accuser might be no more than a bank account number controlled by the attorney on behalf of his fake client. The accuser might just be the fatter wallet of an attorney. That the victim might be a false accuser or might not even exist doesn’t matter to the Judas bishops and priests. It’s not about the victim. It’s not about a falsely accused priest. It’s about saving money.
• The bishops and chancery toadies involved in all this by way of the Dallas Charter policies include almost every bishop, almost every chancery toady in the USCCB, almost to a man. IF any of them truly understand what is going on, and act in accord with the stated policies of the NCRRG, then, in that case — a stretch? — are they not, then…

“… filled with every form of wickedness, evil, greed, and malice; full of envy, murder, rivalry, treachery, and spite[?] [Are they not...] gossips and scandalmongers and [do] they [not]hate God[?]. [Are they not] insolent, haughty, boastful, ingenious in their wickedness, and rebellious toward their parents [toward the Holy Father, Benedict XVI][?] [Are they not] senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless”[?] (Romans 1,29-31 ~nab~).

Indeed. So, what happens from there?

• If the priest doesn’t go to prison, he often has no financial or medical help whatsoever from his diocese, even if he is not laicized. He is put on a sex-offenders list, regardless of guilt or innocence, in view of the bogus settlement made often without the knowledge of the accused priest. That means that he’s not going to be hired by anyone for anything. His address is advertised on the internet and he is a constant target for getting beaten even to death, or shot. He will have protesters with placards outside whatever welfare hovel he has managed to find… I could go on…
• If the priest does go to prison, he faces getting “eliminated” by his fellow prisoners. If he survives, there are constant humiliations, strip searches, cavity searches, getting tazered, pepper sprayed, beaten until bones are broken and internal injuries are sustained. He can be thrown into solitary confinement for years and years and years. Medications are simply not provided. Health is lost, death is forced. Freedom is lost, utterly. Privacy is lost, utterly. All is hell. One toilet is shared by dozens and dozens of prisoners. Temperatures can reach 115+ Fahrenheit with no movemet of stale air, and that’s at night. Boxes arriving in the kitchen are all marked “Not fit for human consumption.”
• All one’s plans, hopes, dreams, are totally shattered. All one’s worldy possessions, books, notes, chalices, vestments, keepsakes…. all gone to the scavengers. Should you not die in prison, you face living under a bridge if you get out. You have no place to go outside the prison door. Everyone hates you and wishes you were dead, wishes you were dead, wishes you were dead, wishes you were dead, wishes you were dead. Did I mention that your bishop and your fellow priests and everyone else wishes that you were dead? Dead. Dead and rotting. Gone. Nice, huh?

Get it? From one moment to the next, out of the blue, life is totally changed. Some priests cannot handle this, regardless of guilt or innocence. As Father Gordon says, it’s those who are innocent who, in fact, take all this much worse than those who are guilty. Get it? I bet that most, if not all accused priests who take their own lives are innocent of the crimes charged against them.

Let’s review: priests are weak. When they are betrayed by bishops and chancery toadies, their spirits are gutted, and they are sundered. Hanging, drawing, and quartering would seem to be better. Demonically icey betrayal is hard to take. They commit suicide. They don’t think about it. They just do it. It’s all too much.

But Father! But Father! Why do you talk about myriads of Catholic priests committing suicide. We’re only talking about a few dozen in America. Aren’t you exaggerating?

Again, the Holy See is in the proces right now of collecting policies of dioceses around the world. I’ve reviewed some of those. One in particular was much worse than the Dallas Charter. How can that be? NGOs! You know, Non-Governmental Organizations. They will help to constitute the review boards, even though they are, generally speaking, diametically opposed to the ways of the Catholic Church, and would like nothing better than to send priests to prison just to do it.

Is the Holy Father being told? I seriously doubt it. This involves money. No one wants Pope Benedict XVI interfering with them while they attempt to save money at the expense of mere priests. Remember, policies involving quicky settlements which do not honor the justice and due process for priests saves untold millions, indeed, billions of dollars. And when this goes world wide, and priests are everywhere subject to false accusation, what do you think will happen. There will be suicides. Many of them. Even we priests, because of the lack of formation these past decades, just don’t know how to face total and utter betrayal. We have to learn quick. Yep. But don’t think it will happen so quickly. Educating priests for this betrayal would be easier if the Catholic blogosphere carried the story.

But Father! But Father! The Catholic blogosphere, generally speaking, couldn’t give a damn about justice and due process for priests. All liberals and pretty much all conservative Catholics hold all priests to be guilty, hating their priests literally to death, because, you know, they congratulate themselves as being clean, and don’t want to dirty themselves with honesty, justice, integrity, you know, stuff like that.

Yep. They’re all just liberal rat-bags who couldn’t give a damn about God or man. They have zero idea about the crucifixion of the Son of God. They’re not Catholic. They’re just sycophantic toadies of political correctness. They might look conservative, but they know nothing of solidarity, of the Living Truth, the Living Charity that God is.

But Father! But Father! The wolves are scarey!

Pray. Then do something. Let’s review:

Anyone who conceals the Truth for fear of some authority calls down the wrath  of God upon himself, because he fears men more than God… Both are  guilty:  he who conceals the Truth and he who speaks falsehood, because  the former does not wish to make the Truth known and the latter desires  not to refute it. -  St. Augustine, died A.D. 430

Augustine is a favorite of many…

But I’m afraid I’ll be shut down. People won’t like me!

Know that the Lion of the Tribe of Judah takes no prisoners. He wants people to be crucified with Him. He wants them to lay down their lives for another. He wants them to know this goodness and kindness. He wants this kindness done for His priests.

Why not write your own story with the aid of the zillion links in this post and in the linked posts. Or, if you blog on WordPress, simply press the re-blog button. Or provide a note and a link on your blog. It’s time we find out how it is that Jesus makes all things new.