Infiltration... Top selling catholic book on amazon

[RealisticCatholic]

First off, I lost all respect for Taylor Marshall after he mocked a seminarian at my parish as “effeminate” on Twitter publicly for all to see.

Second, these kinds of book are counter-productive. If I was a Christian or secularist going through the list of books and saw that, I would totally think it’s in the same line of Dan Brown conspiracy and think: “Duh, the Catholic Church is just a rotten institution and is not what it claims to be.”

I’ll stick with Jesus, the Church, and the Holy Father any day, as well as love, compassion, and mercy.

 

[RealisticCatholic]

Yep, seminarian at my parish.

It’s personal.

No thanks, Taylor.

Shows you where their heart is. Maybe the root of this is homophobia after all?

 

[commenter]

What need, in the typical expected reader, is this book designed to meet?
As near as I can tell, the author perceives:
*** his readers have an insufficient level of alarm. ***

As a result of reading this book:
*** the readers will hopefully have a higher level of alarm***

For the reader, the advantages of this book should be obvious.

 

[phil19034]

Dr Marshall was on the edge of my attention, I would occasionally read his stuff, struck me as arrogant but that is not a deal killer for me.

Then he mocked seminarians for baking gingerbread.

This mockery was at the level of a 12 year old playground bully. Nope. This scratched the surface to reveal plain old ugly “Red Pill/MGTOW” attitudes.

https://www.kansascity.com/news/nation-world/article222987975.html

Nope, not going to put a penny in his pocket.

Taylor Marshall is a good guy.

The problem with the Gingerbread men situation wasn’t that some seminarians wanted to bake gingerbread cookies.

The problem was they were all “forced” to bake gingerbread cookies for a priest

 

[Bushum]

Second, these kinds of book are counter-productive. If I was a Christian or secularist going through the list of books and saw that, I would totally think it’s in the same line of Dan Brown conspiracy and think: “Duh, the Catholic Church is just a rotten institution and is not what it claims to be.”

We should definitely just bury our heads in the sand and pretend there are no problems in the Church. Surely the problem will just go away on its own. If we don’t bring it up then the secularists and Protestants won’t notice. It’s working great so far.

 

[angel12]

We should definitely just bury our heads in the sand and pretend there are no problems in the Church.

Good thing you’re the only one here saying that.

 

[commenter]

RealisticCatholic:

Second, these kinds of book are counter-productive. If I was a Christian or secularist going through the list of books and saw that, I would totally think it’s in the same line of Dan Brown conspiracy and think: “Duh, the Catholic Church is just a rotten institution and is not what it claims to be.”

We should definitely just bury our heads in the sand and pretend there are no problems in the Church. Surely the problem will just go away on its own. If we don’t bring it up then the secularists and Protestants won’t notice. It’s working great so far.

Actually there’s not much difference between burying your head in the sand, and reading Taylor, etc. Reading his stuff and similar work is more an emotional than practical experience for the reader.
People who tune into Taylor are already alarmed. He helps them become more so. Then in 2 years
when their alarm starts lagging, they can buy the sequel.

And this is more helpful than the sand?

 

[Bushum]

Yes this is certainly more helpful than the sand. Pretending a problem does not exist is not helpful and only encourages more abuses. His book is not some emotional opinion piece, it is heavily sourced. If you want to pretend that all of his sources are part of a multi century conspiracy then that’s your delusion. We don’t all need follow it.

 

[Phillip_Rolfes]

I don’t think anyone is denying that a problem exists in the Church today. I think what people - particularly the authors of the articles linked above - are questioning is whether Dr. Marshall has successfully put his finger on the problem. Dr. Jeffrey Mirus clearly claims that he doesn’t, whereas Fr. Dwight Longenecker doesn’t really give his opinion but says, “Let’s give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he has successfully put his finger on the problem…” Incidentally, Fr. Longenecker links to another article by David Armstrong that, like the article by Dr. Mirus, pretty much tears Dr. Marshall’s position apart.

 

[RealisticCatholic]

Yeah go re-read the tweet.

Out of line.

 

[phil19034]

Yeah go re-read the tweet.

Out of line.

OK, but listen that the podcast where Dr. Marshall explains himself and where he apologizes for sounding unchartible.

We all know that twitter can easily make someone sound like a jerk.

But he did have a point… why were there some seminarians who felt peer pressure to make gingerbread houses for a priest (who was their seminary professor)?

Why not make them with orphans at a Catholic orphanage? Or even buy all the professors cookies? Or even bake cookies for all the professors? But that’s not what was happening. Why make gingerbread houses for just ONE male professor (who is also a priest)?

I don’t know a single man in college who would ever do this just for fun unless they had a crush on the professor.

So from the outside, looking in, it just seems a little off. Esp in the post McCarrick world we live in.

That my friend, is the realistic truth.

 

[TheLittleLady]

Cooking skills are important for priests, gone are the days of live in cooks for the rectory.

Baking cookies for orphans is not something to be mocked, it is an act of kindness.

 

[Bushum]

I don’t think anyone is denying that a problem exists in the Church today. I think what people - particularly the authors of the articles linked above - are questioning is whether Mr. Marshall has successfully put his finger on the problem.

Why did you manage to realize that the person you agree with has a doctorate yet twice you called Dr. Marshal “Mr. Marshal”? Being passive aggressive is unbecoming.
post:25:

Second, these kinds of book are counter-productive. If I was a Christian or secularist going through the list of books and saw that, I would totally think it’s in the same line of Dan Brown conspiracy and think: “Duh, the Catholic Church is just a rotten institution and is not what it claims to be.”

This post clearly indicates that he believes the mere topic of the book is counter productive because a secularist or Protestant might see the topic and realize there is something wrong in the Catholic Church. The argument that the content is disputed is not even mentioned. This is the post to which I made my comment. This is a clear example of burying one’s head in the sand.

 

[phil19034]

conclusions based simply on allegations or rumors. His book isn’t a “who done it” of conspiracy theories, where he gives his own conclusions as to the “why” of what transpired.

Obviously he has a belief about the infiltration of the Church, but his book, if I had to use an analogy, would be similar to a detective or private investigator, who compiled all the fruits of their investigation and laid them out for everyone to see. Yet, some of the information in his book is included, not because Dr. Marshall believes in its authenticity, but to show how questionable and uncertain a given event was.

In the end it’s up to the reader to decide what to accept and what to dismiss.

In the final pages Dr. Marshall answers the question of “what do we do now?” In short he advises staying faithful to the Church and trusting in God to fight for us, but also t

baking cookies for orphans is great.

But that’s not what they were doing. They were baking gingerbread houses for themselves and apparently for one of their professors.

The problem isn’t the activity itself.

The problem is “was it a form of forced fun?” What would have happened to the seminarians who didn’t want to participate?

I make gingerbread houses with my kids every year, but I surely don’t do it because I find it relaxing. It’s stressful and I can’t wait to never do it again.

So just like back in Dec, everyone is getting bent out of shape over nothing because it is a fair question to ask: (1) what would have happened to those who didn’t want to participate? And (2), were there some who were making the Gingerbread houses out of obligation?

One of the things that a lot of people do not understand is that seminarians have very little free time and what time they do have for recreation is very structured. So if they were making gingerbread houses, it easy for someone who question whether this was “forced fun.”

And as someone who worked at Boy Scout camp for many years, I personally always hated “forced fun.”

 

[Bushum]

Baking cookies for orphans is not something to be mocked, it is an act of kindness.

You are either being purposefully obtuse or you missed the point about the ginger bread house (not cookies for orphans). I hope it’s the latter. No one is mocking charity. To even imply so is a false argument.

 

[TheLittleLady]

Why not buy cookies for kids at a Catholic orphanage?

I took this to mean that there were orphans involved.

So, gingerbread was simply baked for a professor? Okay, still I fail to see how that is mock worthy.

 

[Phillip_Rolfes]

You are right, of course. Being passive-aggressive is unbecoming, and I regret my decision not to give Dr. Marshall his academic due (and I’ve amended my original post). That being said, it doesn’t change the truth of what I pointed out in the rest of my post.

 

[phil19034]

phil19034:

Why not buy cookies for kids at a Catholic orphanage?

I took this to mean that there were orphans involved.

So, gingerbread was simply baked for a professor? Okay, still I fail to see how that is mock worthy.

It’s not mock worthy.

1. Dr. Marshall deleted his tweet when he realized it was being taken out of context.

The issue is how things are done in seminaries. A seminary isn’t exactly like college. Yes, they have academic professors, but they also have formation directors. They also have a horarium that is traditionally quite packed with scheduled activities.

Traditionally, recreation in the horarium is far more limited than the traditional college student. So it is a valid question to ask if this was a form of “forced fun,” one in which the seminarian would have received negative marks from the formation director if he didn’t want to participate.

Now, one might be able to argue that Dr. Marshall didn’t make good use of Twitter and he for one would agree with you. He came off bad. However, that doesn’t negate value of the question.

Were there seminarians participating in this activity because they felt they had to?

 

[TheLittleLady]

I know that back in my corporate America days, I have been “forced” to participate in team building exercises because I felt I had to.

Having worked for parishes now for a long time, Seminarians are expected to show up and participate in fundraisers, “fun-raisers”, things they might not pick for themselves but that make a good PR story. Gets them ready for the pie-in-face, dunking booths, etc that they will do for parish fund raisers for the rest of their pastoral lives.

Learning to be a good sport is important for a priest.

 

[AlNg]

Gets them ready for the pie-in-face, dunking booths, etc that they will do for parish fund raisers for the rest of their pastoral lives.

IMHO, throwing a pie in the face of a priest or of a seminarian is not respectful.