Archdiocese removes prominent Detroit priest from pulpit

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Eh, IIRC, CM was critical of Bp. Conley w/r/t his handling of abuse allegations regarding seminarians and a former priest vocation director in the Diocese of Lincoln - -can’t get much more orthodox than that in the USA. I’m not on that site enough to know if there are other instances, but I think your characterization is inaccurate.
 
choose_to_love said:
Eh, IIRC, CM was critical of Bp. Conley w/r/t his handling of abuse allegations regarding seminarians and a former priest vocation director in the Diocese of Lincoln - -can’t get much more orthodox than that in the USA. I’m not on that site enough to know if there are other instances, but I think your characterization is inaccurate.
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It’s a weak argument to vaguely recall one incident and not to correctly cite it at all while saying you’re not on the site often. Bishop Conley has been attacked by CM for reaching out to a group that believes women should be priests, trying to individually bring the women back into the fold. He’s hardly the conservative that Voris likes.
 
Sor-ry! Sheesh. You realize every post in this thread from you has an allegation against Mr. Voris without substantiation via link, right?
 
It seems to me that in the current environment, every priest is presumed guilty until proved innocent.

Anyone can make an allegation against a priest citing something that allegedly occurred 30 or 40 years ago. The fact that an allegation is made is deemed a “credible allegation.” Other people who seem to have been quiet for decades may make additional allegations. Perhaps there is a monetary incentive, given dioceses’ propensity to agree to quick settlements without ever testing the truth of the allegations.

If an allegation is made, why not let the legal authorities handle it, using the standard of innocent until proven guilty?
 
The lack of due process for an accused per the minimum NUMBER of witnesses necessary to take just action would seem to be missing in this case. And the counsels are quite ancient. From the Bible itself …

If anyone has trouble following that counsel … it might be just as easy for persons inclined to be critical of the Diocese’s leaders who are enforcing this priest’s removal to be removed themselves by a single person’s unsubstantiated charge(s).

A “single somebody said something – and it’s such a serious thing that we must act decisively without further discernment” – seems like a recipe for Church anarchy that’d please the devil if adopted.

The Law concerning Witnesses​

Deuteronomy 19:**[15] One witness is not enough to convict anyone accused of any crime or offense they may have committed. A matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses. **[16] ** If a malicious witness takes the stand to accuse someone of a crime, **[17] ** the two people involved in the dispute must stand in the presence of the Lord before the priests and the judges who are in office at the time. **[18] ** The judges must make a thorough investigation, and if the witness proves to be a liar, giving false testimony against a fellow Israelite, **[19] then do to the false witness as that witness intended to do to the other party. You must purge the evil from among you.

** 20 The rest of the people will hear of this and be afraid, and never again will such an evil thing be done among you.

**21 Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.
 
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The traditionalist pastor in the church that Michael Voris goes to in Detroit just got removed for potential child abuse…did I get this right?

If nothing else, this one will be an interesting one to watch.

I’m not really a fan of the Church Militant, but this one actually could be more of “political” hit.
 
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Well, Church Militant has just ensured that we will never know the full truth of accusations against Fr. Perrone. In a discussion in the comments section of Church Militant - Serving Catholics, CM (who is a mod with the site) said

“We know who the accuser is, his background, as well as the individuals who are manipulating him for their own purposes.”

So, the information on who the accuser is has leaked to the press by someone who is seeking to have Fr. Perrone looked at in a more favorable light. Now that Church Militant has said this, the accuser now knows that he may be named publicly and face attacks because he is accusing a popular priest of abuse. I wouldn’t be surprised if the story changes. Furthermore, any other potential accusers of Fr. Perrone now know they cannot remain anonymous if they come forward with their stories.

The investigation is now hopelessly compromised.
 
drcube said:
Interesting addition to the story where we find out that Fr. Perrone was a co-founder of Opus Bono, an organization that brought accused priests to Michigan and assisted in their defense.
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This is Nuts!
 
@drcube …Thanks for posting these. It is useful information that needs to be understood. I’d “like” these posts, but there is nothing to “like”.
 
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It is disturbing. I looked a bit deeper and there are a few aspects of the AP article that I think were not as clear as they could have been. Fr. Perrone clearly never believed the accusations of rape against Fr. Houndjame (as stated in a radio interview with Opus Bono radio that is on YouTube) and Houndjame was found innocent of the charges against him.

I find it interesting that Michael Voris would attend a Church that the pastor was a founder of an organization to help accused priests and one can plainly see Opus Bono brochures printed out and available at Madonna Grotto. After all, Church Militant is one of the biggest attackers on homosexuality causing the abuse crisis in the Church. It would explain how Church Militant knows so much about this case, as Mary Rose Maher claimed on a reddit post that Michael Voris is a friend of Joe Maher, who ran Opus Bono. This might explain how Church Militant claims to know so much about this case.

If you look at Mary Rose Maher’s biography on St. Mary’s Haven, she claims that Fr. Perrone drank with children (which Perrone denied) and said he is a ‘serial abuser’, which is way beyond what has been reported in the press. I do have concerns that she is not a reliable witness based on that inconsistency, but it is clear that the AP had interviewed her before talking with Fr. Perrone about the accusations against him.

The whole thing is very ugly.
 
drcube said:
I find it interesting that Michael Voris would attend a Church that the pastor was a founder of an organization to help accused priests and one can plainly see Opus Bono brochures printed out and available at Madonna Grotto. After all, Church Militant is one of the biggest attackers on homosexuality causing the abuse crisis in the Church.
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Yes, I read things like this and I really think I’m missing something in the big picture of everything. I don’t get it!
 
Opinion piece at Church Militant

https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/fr-perrone-a-political-hit-job

I agree with some points here: the AP article should have mentioned that Fr. Houndjame was found innocent. But it seems to miss the point that Fr. Perrone was closely involved in an organization which helps priests accused of sex abuse of children.

The investigation continues to be very leaky with the results of Fr. Perrone’s lie detector test now published.
 
More weirdness at Church Militant.

When a commenter points out that Ann Barnhardt said that Fr. Perrone " literally founded and ran a massive fraudulent non-profit that sheltered countless abuser priests", the poster CM (a mod at the Church Militant site said

" Barnhardt is uninformed. Instead of investigating the truth, she took AP at its word and wrote a piece based on AP’s dishonest article.

Opus Bono was begun as a project to help any priests in need, whatever the situation. It was supported by solid, faithful, orthodox clergy, and Opus Bono, from what we understand, did help a number of good priests. It was not focused exclusively on accused priests (as the AP article suggests). Father Perrone served as an occasional spiritual advisor. He had nothing to do with its financials (the MI attorney general exonerated Perrone of any financial misdealings).

Over time, as more money poured in, the fundraising efforts of Opus Bono began to raise eyebrows - including ours, when we learned Opus Bono (through its co-founders Pete Ferrara and Joe Maher) were raising funds for priests like Fr. Robert DeLand.

They were eventually forced to shut down after an investigation by the MI AG revealed Ferrara and Maher were skimming donations for personal use. We reported on it here:

https://www.churchmilitant…

As we said above, however, Fr. Perrone was exonerated of any wrongdoing in all of this, as he was not involved in the running of the outfit nor had any knowledge of its financials."

Ok, let’s see how much Fr. Perrone had to do with Opus Bono and what its purpose was based on this 2013 interview (
). Fr. Perrone asked Joe Maher to help create the structure to support Fr. Houndjame when he was accused and eventually charged with rape in 2002. From that, “it was shortly thereafter that the crisis broke out across the country and we were prepared. We already had this test case of a priest being tried and so Opus Bono was born out of that. We already had an idea on how we were going to approach it with assisting a priest in a troubled situation.”

Of course this refers to priests being accused of sexually assaulting children. Was there another crisis that broke out in the priesthood in the last twenty years? Who is CM kidding here? No one is accusing Fr. Perrone of financial malpractice, but he most assuredly knew the purpose of Opus Bono and CM shouldn’t be lying that it was for something different than what Perrone himself said it was for.

Michael Voris’ priest provided support for pedophile priests. It’s really that simple.
 
drcube said:
After the results of the lie detector test leaked to Church Militant to be reported yesterday, Perrone’s lawyer issued a statement today that Perrone had passed the lie detector test.
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Just a thought on this. I had assumed above that the Church had asked Fr. Perrone to do the lie detector’s test and it was leaked. It wasn’t. This was paid for by Fr. Perrone’s defense and had nothing to do with the Church investigation into allegations of abuse. It seems like a waste of money given the unreliable of lie detector tests, but it’s good press and that was the purpose.
 
Church Militant published an interview with Fr. Perrone today that probably took place a few weeks ago.

https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/exclusive-interview-fr-eduard-perrone

Of course, it is risky for someone accused of such an offense to be interviewed, but Voris asks nothing but softball questions (Opus Bono doesn’t come up at all) and uses the opportunity to slam the AP for bad journalism (keep in mind this is the organization that published an article claiming Cdl. Bernardin of having sex with an underaged girl as a priest in South Carolina as part of a Satanic mass headed by the local bishop).

The article accompanying the article attacks the usual suspects again (nothing like saying critics claim that it is a witch hunt when the critics link to a Church Militant opinion piece) and then in the comments section, CM claims to know more about Msgr. Bugarin (the priest overseeing the investigation), so it’s okay that they continuously slam him.

Honestly, if Fr. Perrone is alright with all the personal attacks that CM is putting out on his behalf, I have serious concerns about his ability to be a good priest, irregardless of the charges against him.
 
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