Fr. Andrew Greeley's Dirty Secret?

The Illinois Leader ^ | Matt C. Abbott

[mattcabbott]

Fr. Andrew Greeley continues to chastise the Catholic Church for its handling of the clergy sex abuse scandal. The soft-porn novel-writing priest has always been part of the solution, you see. Not that he doesn't have some valid points. After all, no reasonable Catholic can deny that certain bishops have been, at the very least, grossly negligent in their duties. And this doesn't even take into account the widespread dissent and lack of orthodoxy in the American church.

But, alas, Greeley is a liberal. He's quick to point out the "hypocrisy" of the "right-wing" whenever it makes an assertion, whether in the realm of politics or in the realm of religion. And that, I must say, is most irritating - especially in light of the following:

In Greeley's 1999 non-fiction book "Furthermore! Memories of a Parish Priest," on page 80, he writes:

"...But even in Chicago, the ring of predators about whom I wrote in the paperback edition of 'Confessions' remains untouched. There is no evidence against them because no one has complained about them and none of their fellow priests have denounced them. Those who have been removed are for the most part lone offenders who lacked the skill to cover their tracks. The ring is much more clever. Perhaps they always will be. But should they slip, should they get caught, the previous scandals will seem trivial...."

A footnote states:

"They are a dangerous group. There is reason to believe that they are responsible for at least one murder, and may perhaps have been involved in the murder of the murderer. Am I afraid of them? Not particularly. They know that I have in safekeeping information which would implicate them. I am more of a threat to them dead than alive."

(The murder Greeley is alluding to in the above passage is almost certainly that of Francis E. Pellegrini, who was the organist and choir director at All Saints - St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church, located on Chicago's South side. Pellegrini was allegedly in the process of exposing to the archdiocese the activities of the clergy sex/pedophile ring, but was found brutally murdered in his apartment on May 30, 1984. To date, the murder remains officially unsolved.)

The obvious questions: If Greeley is truly interested in justice and the good of the Catholic Church, why has he thus far refused to expose this "dangerous group"? Why is the "information" in "safekeeping" and not with the proper authorities? And what about the newspapers that run Greeley's columns? One would think that they would be aware of his (public) allegation. Yet, the silence from them on the matter is deafening.

As for the Church, the Archdiocese of Chicago has no information to corroborate the allegation "that a ring of priests may have been involved in criminal activity. Nevertheless, when this information was published, the Archdiocese brought it to the attention of the State's Attorney in Cook County." So stated a letter sent to Yours truly, dated July 31, 2001, from John C. O'Malley, director of legal services for the Archdiocese. And, according to Cardinal Francis George, Greeley hasn't provided him with any actual evidence on the matter.

So...is it a case of Greeley's smarmy fiction, or is it a case of his liberal hypocrisy? Or both?

(Matt C. Abbott is the former executive director of the Illinois Right to Life Committee and the former director of public affairs for the Chicago-based Pro-life Action League, respectively. He is also a contributor to "The Wanderer" Catholic newspaper.)

[american colleen]

Welcome to FReerepublic!

Thanks for all your work.

[ninenot]

Greeley's lips move: that's when he's lying. In addition, his fingers type--another sure sign of him lying. He dreams lies; he lives lies. He's never met a Truth he doesn't despise. (Robert Frost)

Other than that...

[ninenot]

See post #18.

[mattcabbott]

Thanks, Brian! Now that I have Internet access at home, I have been trying to "broaden my horizons." I like it!

As for "The Illinois Leader," it is indeed a (conservative) secular site, dealing mainly with Illinois politics and social conservatism. I've had a few op-eds on it thus far.

Everyone should check it out...www.illinoisleader.com. And feel free to contribute to it as much as you'd like!

[mattcabbott]

Thanks!!

[Polycarp]

Excerpt from WND article that Matt linked in post #8. There is just too mush here to dismiss the charges against Bernardin as "conspiracy theory":

...Brady's activities have earned him the enmity of the homosexual community.

One individual with ties to the Catholic homosexual group Dignity, as well as St. Sebastian's Angels, published Brady's private home address and phone number on the Internet, referred to RCF as a "hate group," described Brady as motivated by "evil purposes" and labeled him as a "perpetrator."

In another incident, which was reported to the FBI, Brady learned from a second-hand source that an e-mail message was circulating on the Internet stating that someone has placed a "contract" out for Brady's assassination.

Murder tied to priests' club?

While the threats against Brady are unsettling, there are indications that those who delve too deeply into the connection between clerical homosexuality and child abuse – finding perversion slipping into an abyss of satanic ritual – may pay for their curiosity with their lives.

In the late 1980s, two young Chicago private investigators, Bill Callaghan and Hank Adema, agreed to assist a "friend of a friend," whose child had been molested by a priest of the Chicago Archdiocese.

The parents of the abused child sought help after the Archdiocese under Joseph Cardinal Bernardin threatened to counter-sue following their original allegations. Before the scandal of clerical child abuse came to the public's attention through the efforts of the mass media, it was common practice for a diocese to file a libel suit against parents who charged diocesan clergy with abusive behavior.

As their investigation into the background of the abusive priest proceeded, Callaghan and Adema discovered the existence of a homoerotic group, made up mostly of priests, calling itself The Boys' Club.

During their inquiry into the membership and activities of The Boys' Club, a woman identifying herself as the girlfriend of a murdered church organist contacted the investigators and stated that she had information that would be useful to them.

The woman's friend was one Frank Pellegrini, once the organist and choir director at All Saints-St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church on Chicago's South Side. Pellegrini had also served as chair of the Sociology Department of Loyola University of Chicago.

According to the information obtained from the girlfriend, Pellegrini had a homosexual relationship with one of the priests involved in The Boys' Club, but was in the process of leaving the priest-lover and marrying her.

Before completely severing ties with the priest, however, Pellegrini discovered that The Boys' Club was involved with far more than homosexual relations. Tied closely with their sexual exploits was ritualistic satanic worship and the regular abuse of young children from low-income, ethnic families.

Pellegrini informed the Chicago Archdiocesan Chancery, and scheduled a meeting with one of the archdiocese's top officials.

The day before the meeting, Pellegrini was brutally murdered in his home, which showed no signs of forced entry.

Callaghan, who spoke with police personnel originally working on the case, stated that Pellegrini was found with his hands tied with barbed wire and had been stabbed repeatedly.

Even Pellegrini's dog was slashed, leaving it seriously wounded but alive.

In the opinion of police detective/profilers working on the case, the brutality and manner of the killing indicated that it was carried out either by a woman or a homosexual, Callaghan stated.

Pellegrini was stabbed 47 times – the same number of years he had lived.

Just after Pellegrini's body was discovered, and while police were still on the scene of the murder, police observed two unusual incidents, Callaghan reported.

The first involved the arrival of then-Cardinal Archbishop of Chicago – and one of the most powerful men in the American Catholic Church – Joseph Bernardin. Although there was never an indication that Bernardin met Pellegrini, he arrived at the murder scene and quizzed police personnel on the progress of the investigation.

Left unanswered was how Bernardin learned of the killing and why he should personally visit the scene of a relatively unimportant individual whom he had no reason to know.

The second incident involved Pellegrini's dog. As the police conducted their investigation at the scene, the dog remained quiet, still suffering from its wounds. When the dog saw priests come into the apartment, it suddenly became aggressive and barked wildly.

The Pellegrini murder occurred in 1984 and was "reopened" with federal funds in the early 1990s, but many of the investigation's informal police notes have been "lost," and important leads in the case have never been fully followed up, according to Callaghan. The Pellegrini case, at present, remains one of the many hundreds of unsolved Chicago murders.

Although Callaghan never met Pellegrini, nor participated in the original investigation, he and Adema found that whatever secrets the case entailed posed a direct threat to their own lives.

As Callaghan and Adema pressed on with their investigation on behalf of their client, they learned of a warning, which came through contacts in the Chicago Police Department.

Callaghan learned that mob informants had stated that a contract had been offered on his life, and on that of Adema, by an individual closely tied to the Pellegrini case.

Although no one in the local underworld was interested, there did exist the real possibility that the contract could be accepted by "a black or biker gang," Callaghan revealed.

The full extent of The Boys' Club influence in Chicago – and beyond – still remains unclear, as does the extent of ritual abuse associated with clerical assaults on children.

Hush money?

There is, however, ample evidence that ritual abuse does occur, and it is most obvious in the case of "Agnes."

In the opening pages of his best-selling book, "Windswept House," The Rev. Malachi Martin describes a satanic ritual carried out on a young girl. Although Martin used a degree of literary license in the description of the event, there is a real individual behind the story and an actual instance of satanic abuse.

"Agnes," a pseudonym for her actual name, met Fiore some years ago for assistance with spiritual guidance and counseling for the long-term effects of cult abuse she had suffered at age 11.

Agnes has consented to and passed several polygraph examinations and is now married with a family in a Southern city. She has made her accusations in sworn affidavits, written statements to Vatican officials and has directly confronted those whom she has accused.

Among those Agnes has implicated in the attack upon her was a young, rapidly advancing priest named Joseph Bernardin.

Agnes states that in the fall of 1957, in Greenville, S.C., with her father present, Bishop John Russell of the Charleston Archdiocese and his chancellor, Bernardin, raped her as part of a satanic ritual, which included, as a RCF report stated, "a perverted, sacrilegious use of a [consecrated] host."

According to Catholic teaching, a consecrated host is the true and total body, blood, soul, and divinity of Jesus Christ, Second Person of the Blessed Trinity.

Agnes also became acquainted with Steven Cook, another individual who accused Bernardin of abuse. Cook accused Bernardin of coercing him into homosexual acts while he was a seminarian and Bernardin was archbishop in Cincinnati, Ohio.

While the media consistently have reported that Cook "recanted" his accusation against Bernardin, Cook, who was dying of AIDS, simply stated that he could "no longer trust his memory."

Callaghan interviewed Cook as part of his own investigation, and verified that Cook did not "recant." He learned that the dying homosexual, formerly of very modest means, suddenly had developed considerable financial resources. Estimates of the value of the newly established estate range from $250,000 to several million. After Cook's death, the money was divided between his mother, his sister and his male lover.

Bernardin, who said he had never met Cook, also left the dying man a costly chalice, which Bernardin had used to offer Mass in Cook's Philadelphia apartment. In addition to Cook and Bernardin, Cook's homosexual lover was also in attendance at the Mass. Cook made no secret of his homosexuality, and there is no indication that Cook would have hidden the identity of his male lover.

Giving Holy Communion under such circumstances, according to traditional Catholic teaching, constitutes sacrilege.

Bernardin also was implicated in an alleged incident of abuse perpetrated against seminarians attending the Immaculate Heart of Mary Seminary in Winona, Minn., in the 1980s.

According to a Boston Globe report, Bernardin, along with several "top prelates," were accused of "coercing seminarians at Immaculate Heart of Mary Seminary … into having sex."

The rector of the seminary, the Rev. Robert H. Brom, was also implicated in the sex-abuse charges. At the time the seminarian made his allegations, Brom served as Bishop of Duluth, Minn. Brom now is bishop of San Diego, Calif.

The Winona seminarian later retracted his charges, but he received a settlement payment of "less than $100,000," according to the Globe report, which quoted Archbishop Roger L. Schwietz, of Anchorage, successor to Brom as bishop of Duluth.

The circumstances of the seminarian's retraction, however, recently have come into question.

In a sworn affidavit, Mark Brooks, a friend of the seminarian who received the settlement payment, claims that the retraction of the charges against the bishops is false, according to a report in the San Diego Union-Tribune. The retraction was issued, according to Brooks, because the seminarian "needed the money."

Brooks' affidavit was filed in San Diego Superior Court in connection with a press investigation of abuse allegations against Brom.

In the mid-1980s, the Diocese of San Diego settled a lawsuit initiated by Brooks claiming abuse. The Diocese settled for an undisclosed sum.

[Barnacle]

Mattcabbott,

Welcome to Free Republic. I read this article in the Illinois Leader and was probably going to post it today. Now, I see that you are the article's author. It's terrific that you had the honor of posting it yourself.

You are most welcome here on Free Republic. You will find you are among many friends. And, to my initial amazement, you will find unabashed anti-Catholicism as well. It isn’t as bad as it used to be since Jim Robinson put his foot down and a certain number of us decided that we were not going to take Catholic bashing lying down. But again, as in life, it’s your friends you focus on, not the jerks. And you’ll find many good Conservative Catholics here on the best web site the Internet has to offer.

I suggest asking to get on their “ping lists.” I imagine Polycarp has already added your name to his. With your permission, I will add you to mine.

Now, to your article…

As for the Church, the Archdiocese of Chicago has no information to corroborate the allegation "that a ring of priests may have been involved in criminal activity. Nevertheless, when this information was published, the Archdiocese brought it to the attention of the State's Attorney in Cook County." So stated a letter sent to yours truly, dated July 31, 2001, from John C. O'Malley, director of legal services for the Archdiocese. And, according to Cardinal Francis George, Greeley hasn't provided him with any actual evidence on the matter.

This says it all. Greeley is to Catholic as Disrupter is to Free Republic. He is indeed a pernicious influence. Perhaps he will someday be defrocked and excommunicated for the treachery he has inflicted on our Church.

[Land of the Irish]

The second incident involved Pellegrini's dog. As the police conducted their investigation at the scene, the dog remained quiet, still suffering from its wounds. When the dog saw priests come into the apartment, it suddenly became aggressive and barked wildly.

Dogs can recognize and smell "wolves".

[JohnnyZ]

If Greeley is truly interested in justice and the good of the Catholic Church, why has he thus far refused to expose this "dangerous group"? Why is the "information" in "safekeeping" and not with the proper authorities?

Greeley's probably holding out for free lifetime membership.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

The obvious questions: If Greeley is truly interested in justice and the good of the Catholic Church, why has he thus far refused to expose this "dangerous group"? Why is the "information" in "safekeeping" and not with the proper authorities? And what about the newspapers that run Greeley's columns? One would think that they would be aware of his (public) allegation. Yet, the silence from them on the matter is deafening.

All accounts I've read tell me that Greeley stays in power (and alive) due to damaging information he keeps on people which is carefully stashed away. He gets away with anything because no one wants to cross him.

The situation is a standoff; a check mate for all parties, so the status quo continues. If Greeley reveals what he's got he loses everything.

[SuziQ]

it just came to me that most of the liberal priests are Irish and had the same background... >

Sometimes it seems as though the Church in Ireland is just a couple of levels above the druids. The priests, but especially the NUNS must have taught variations on Church teachings that folks in the Northeast are still believing and thus find it hard when told what the Church TRULY teaches. It may explain why the Northeastern Catholics are overwhelming liberal. The Church teachings up here seemed to have been filtered through Democrat party politics.

[ninenot]

OTOH, Greeley could be bluffing. And he has another problem which is, paradoxically, a blessing for us: the people on whom he allegedly has the goods are dying, some at a very early age, from diseases.

So while the Church benefits, Greeley's "story" evaporates.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

And he has another problem which is, paradoxically, a blessing for us: the people on whom he allegedly has the goods are dying, some at a very early age, from diseases. So while the Church benefits, Greeley's "story" evaporates.

That's one way we'll get rid of him.

[Antoninus]

All accounts I've read tell me that Greeley stays in power (and alive) due to damaging information he keeps on people which is carefully stashed away. He gets away with anything because no one wants to cross him. The situation is a standoff; a check mate for all parties, so the status quo continues. If Greeley reveals what he's got he loses everything.

That's why it will take a group of dedicated laymen to get the goods on him and all the others. The only way to break the stalemate is by someone totally unexpected from the outside working "freelance." If every one of these pervert priests begins to worry that they may have a "tail," guts may start getting spilled out of sheer panic.

[Thorondir]

Ha ha! Rub it in.

8o)

[Coleus]

`

[fatima]

Bump.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the heads up!

[Judith Anne]

Thanks for the ping. Excellent discussion. I despise Greeley, and I've read Windswept House several times.

[Coleus]

and I've read Windswept House several times.>>>

It's a long read. But well worth it.