Wednesday, March 12, 2014

The Legion. RTE's documentary about the Legionaries

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This documentary is, I think, the best account that I have seen about the role of the Irish in the expansion of the Legionaries of Christ.

Mick Peelo and his team ("Would you believe") did an excellent job. Their greatest merit is that they let the facts speak for themselves. It lasts 52 minutes.

Sunday, March 9, 2014

The story of Fr Marcial Maciel, a priest who founded the Legionaries of Christ in the 1950s despite being under investigation by the Vatican for sodomy, fraud and drug addictio

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This documentary, "The Legion" is available for viewing for the next 21 days. It tells the story of Fr Marcial Maciel, a priest who founded the Legionaries of Christ in the 1950s despite being under investigation by the Vatican for sodomy, fraud and drug addiction. The documentary lasts 52 minutes. It features testimony from me, several former Legionaries, and a couple of Legionary priests. http://www.rte.ie/player/us/show/10260914/

Saturday, March 8, 2014

Background information on "The Legion" a documentary from Irish National Television (RTE)

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As the Legionaries of Christ, known as 'the Legion', was setting up in Ireland in the late 1950s, the founder of this new religious order, Fr Marcial Maciel was under investigation by the Vatican for acts of sodomy with boys, fraud and drug addiction. Despite what the Vatican knew about Maciel, he was allowed to establish a congregation in Ireland and recruit young, enthusiastic Irish men to build the Legion empire from a minority Spanish-speaking Congregation into a powerful international movement within the Catholic Church.

Archbishop John Charles McQuaid facilitated the establishment of the Legion in Ireland, but concluded in a letter in 1970 that "there is a creepiness and secrecy about this whole group that is a constant worry to me." McQuaid's successor, Archbishop Ryan banned them from recruiting in Dublin because of their " lack of freedom of conscience, alienation from parents and undue pressure." Despite the ban, two young Dublin lads secretly consecrated their lives to the movement just six months after they left school. They were told to tell no one, not even their parents.

It took over six decades for the Vatican to intervene, finally condemning Maciel in 2010 as a criminal and a fraud. The Vatican also recognised that the conduct of Fr Maciel gave rise to "serious consequences in the life and structure of the Legion such as to require a process of profound re-evaluation." This month the Legionaries of Christ conclude their extraordinary general chapter which is the culmination of a three year consultation process and marks the beginning of a new way forward. So, what went wrong, what needs to change and can the Legion change it?

Maciel personally tried to recruit the broadcaster Mike Murphy, who remembers: "He came to the house and he tried to get me to join. I'd love to say I had my suspicions, but I didn't instinctively warm to what they were doing." Mike's two brothers and his sister were convinced, however, and enthusiastically enrolled.

Genevieve Kineke believes that the Legion " is a "construct that Maciel put in place specifically to con people out of their money and to con families out of their children." Genevieve was recruited into the movement in the US in the 1990s.

"In the Legion, we were always told that a lie is not a lie if the person you are talking to doesn't have the right to know the truth. Even bishops were lied to." says Glen Favereau, who spent 14 years in the Congregation. Fr Andreas Shöggl, the Legion's European Superior, says that Glenn is almost quoting the Catechism of the Catholic Church: "Sometimes people don't have a right to the truth and you don't have an obligation to tell the truth, but these are very exceptional cases." Paul Lennon, an ex Legionary priest, believes that for the Legion "Truth is just a commodity and they learned that from Fr Maciel."

In this programme Mick Peelo traces the first Legionary who set foot in Ireland in 1956. Now a lay man in California, Federico Dominguez tells the real story about why he came to Ireland. He was Maciel's former Secretary and a whistleblower who was banished to Ireland in 1956 by Maciel, who called him "a traitor to the Legion," after Dominguez passed on information about Maciel's crimes and corruption to the Vatican.

The first Irish recruits, Jack Keogh and Paul Lennon, talk about what attracted them to this new movement and how, for over 20 years, they collaborated in a culture of secrecy and deception. Isaac Chute from Cork, who joined in the early 1980s, speaks about how his personality was changed by the Legion. "When I joined the Legionaries of Christ I was a very normal happy-go-lucky kid and, over time, they kind of moulded me into something that I wasn't."

The following appears on RTE's "Would You Believe" website (© RTÉ 2014-RTÉ Commercial Enterprises Ltd, Registration No: 155076, Donnybrook, Dublin 4, Ireland.)

One of the first Irish recruits, Fr Owen Kearns, who publicly vilified Maciel's victims and accusers in the late 1990s, talks openly about this and the impact on him when he discovered the truth about the founder. "I cried. I lost 7 pounds in 7 days." He explains why he still remains a Legionary today. "God did use a seriously flawed criminal, a sociopath, an abuser and through him set up this, such that when we met it, we knew this is from God." Genevieve Kineke disagrees:  "That's not how the Holy Spirit works. God doesn't use paedophiles in order to build congregations."

In 2008, over 200 documents relating to the Legionaries of Christ were leaked from the Vatican. This programme looks forensically at these documents in the context of what was happening with the Legion in Ireland over the years. The documents show that efforts were made by senior Cardinals in the Vatican in the 50s and 60s to get rid of Maciel, but they were prevented from acting because of "interventions by eminent figures."

The Vatican's seal of approval enabled Maciel to continue to operate for over sixty years unimpeded and with impunity. Five successive popes publicly endorsed Maciel, despite repeated warnings. The leaked documents point to three popes in particular, Pope John XXIII, Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II, whose combination of inertia and support not only allowed Maciel to continue, but elevated him to "Poster Boy" status in the Catholic world. "I didn't question it, because why would I question something that John Paul the Second was praising? " says Marita de Palma, who was a consecrated lay women in the movement. She was eventually expelled from the movement for discussing its practices with her mother and attempted suicide.

Popes John XXIII and John Paul II will become saints on 27th April.

Some of the Irish who joined the Legion and those they recruited believe it is a cult within the Catholic Church. Disillusioned former members believe that the problems run so deep that the Legion cannot be fixed. But the Vatican and the Legion believe there is hope. Fr Schöggl: " If you see some cult-like characteristics, it is not because the Legion is a cult, but because there have been several circumstances, several weaknesses, deficiencies that made us act in a way that was not correct and (we have to) identify them and get rid of them."

Thursday, March 6, 2014

Background on "The Legion" a documentary from Irish National Television (RTE)

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The following information appears on RTE's "Would You Believe" Website
© RTÉ 2014-RTÉ Commercial Enterprises Ltd, Registration No: 155076, Donnybrook, Dublin 4, Ireland.

As the Legionaries of Christ, known as 'the Legion', was setting up in Ireland in the late 1950s, the founder of this new religious order, Fr Marcial Maciel was under investigation by the Vatican for acts of sodomy with boys, fraud and drug addiction. Despite what the Vatican knew about Maciel, he was allowed to establish a congregation in Ireland and recruit young, enthusiastic Irish men to build the Legion empire from a minority Spanish-speaking Congregation into a powerful international movement within the Catholic Church.

Archbishop John Charles McQuaid facilitated the establishment of the Legion in Ireland, but concluded in a letter in 1970 that "there is a creepiness and secrecy about this whole group that is a constant worry to me." McQuaid's successor, Archbishop Ryan banned them from recruiting in Dublin because of their " lack of freedom of conscience, alienation from parents and undue pressure." Despite the ban, two young Dublin lads secretly consecrated their lives to the movement just six months after they left school. They were told to tell no one, not even their parents.

It took over six decades for the Vatican to intervene, finally condemning Maciel in 2010 as a criminal and a fraud. The Vatican also recognised that the conduct of Fr Maciel gave rise to "serious consequences in the life and structure of the Legion such as to require a process of profound re-evaluation." This month the Legionaries of Christ conclude their extraordinary general chapter which is the culmination of a three year consultation process and marks the beginning of a new way forward. So, what went wrong, what needs to change and can the Legion change it?

Maciel personally tried to recruit the broadcaster Mike Murphy, who remembers: "He came to the house and he tried to get me to join. I'd love to say I had my suspicions, but I didn't instinctively warm to what they were doing." Mike's two brothers and his sister were convinced, however, and enthusiastically enrolled.

Genevieve Kineke believes that the Legion ". is a construct that Maciel put in place specifically to con people out of their money and to con families out of their children." Genevieve was recruited into the movement in the US in the 1990s.

"In the Legion, we were always told that a lie is not a lie if the person you are talking to doesn't have the right to know the truth. Even bishops were lied to." says Glen Favereau, who spent 14 years in the Congregation. Fr Andreas Shöggl, the Legion's European Superior, says that Glenn is almost quoting the Catechism of the Catholic Church: "Sometimes people don't have a right to the truth and you don't have an obligation to tell the truth, but these are very exceptional cases." Paul Lennon, an ex Legionary priest, believes that for the Legion "Truth is just a commodity and they learned that from Fr Maciel."

In this programme Mick Peelo traces the first Legionary who set foot in Ireland in 1956. Now a lay man in California, Federico Dominguez tells the real story about why he came to Ireland. He was Maciel's former Secretary and a whistleblower who was banished to Ireland in 1956 by Maciel, who called him "a traitor to the Legion," after Dominguez passed on information about Maciel's crimes and corruption to the Vatican.

The first Irish recruits, Jack Keogh and Paul Lennon, talk about what attracted them to this new movement and how, for over 20 years, they collaborated in a culture of secrecy and deception. Isaac Chute from Cork, who joined in the early 1980s, speaks about how his personality was changed by the Legion. "When I joined the Legionaries of Christ I was a very normal happy-go-lucky kid and, over time, they kind of moulded me into something that I wasn't."

One of the first Irish recruits, Fr Owen Kearns, who publicly vilified Maciel's victims and accusers in the late 1990s, talks openly about this and the impact on him when he discovered the truth about the founder. "I cried.I lost 7 pounds in 7 days." He explains why he still remains a Legionary today. "God did use a seriously flawed criminal, a sociopath, an abuser and through him set up this, such that when we met it, we knew this is from God." Genevieve Kineke disagrees: . ".That's not how the Holy Spirit works. God doesn't use paedophiles in order to build congregations."

In 2008, over 200 documents relating to the Legionaries of Christ were leaked from the Vatican. This programme looks forensically at these documents in the context of what was happening with the Legion in Ireland over the years. The documents show that efforts were made by senior Cardinals in the Vatican in the 50s and 60s to get rid of Maciel, but they were prevented from acting because of "interventions by eminent figures."

The Vatican's seal of approval enabled Maciel to continue to operate for over sixty years unimpeded and with impunity. Five successive popes publicly endorsed Maciel, despite repeated warnings. The leaked documents point to three popes in particular, Pope John XXIII, Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II, whose combination of inertia and support not only allowed Maciel to continue, but elevated him to "Poster Boy" status in the Catholic world. "I didn't question it, because why would I question something that John Paul the Second was praising? " says Marita de Palma, who was a consecrated lay women in the movement. She was eventually expelled from the movement for discussing its practices with her mother and attempted suicide.

Popes John XXIII and John Paul II will become saints on 27th April.

Some of the Irish who joined the Legion and those they recruited believe it is a cult within the Catholic Church. Disillusioned former members believe that the problems run so deep that the Legion cannot be fixed. But the Vatican and the Legion believe there is hope. Fr Schöggl: " If you see some cult-like characteristics, it is not because the Legion is a cult, but because there have been several circumstances, several weaknesses, deficiencies that made us act in a way that was not correct and (we have to) identify them and get rid of them."

"The Legion" a documentary on the spectacular rise and fall from grace of Fr. Marcial Maciel, to be presented by Irish National Television (RTE)

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"Would You Believe?" an Irish National Television (RTE) religious affairs program will air a special episode on Sunday 9th March, at 9.30pm on RTÉ One.

In "THE LEGION," Mick Peelo tells the story of the pivotal role that Ireland played in the spectacular rise and fall from grace of The Legionaries of Christ and their disgraced late founder, Fr Marcial Maciel Degollado LC.

"Fr Maciel, who died in 2008, hid in plain sight for over five decades, and flourished, under five successive Popes as an embezzler, womanizer, drug addict and pedophile, secretly fathering at least three children by two different woman, while being revered by his followers and championed by Rome as a living saint."

Peelo interviewed me for the documentary, based on his reading of my autobiography "Driving Straight on Crooked Lines: How an Irishman found his heart and nearly lost his mind." He told me he thinks the book is mandatory reading for anyone trying to understand Maciel's relationship with the Irish, since it relates the first-hand experience of the first Irish Legionary to set foot in Mexico.

"RTÉ Religious Programmes aim to Reflect, Interrogate, Celebrate and Explain the religious, ethical and spiritual life of contemporary Ireland. We broadcast over 100 hours each year on both television and radio, including documentaries, discussions, interviews, festival features and worship programmes, reflecting the full diversity of religious belief and practice in Ireland.
All of our output can also be found online, either on the RTÉ Player, the RTÉ Radio Player or on the websites of our various strands: WOULD YOU BELIEVE?, THE MEANING OF LIFE, THE MOMENT OF TRUTH, BEYOND BELIEF and THE GOD SLOT."