Guardians of the galaxy: Vatican style

Eddie Siebert,S.J.
National Catholic Reporter
September 13, 2014


Brother Guy Consolmagno, S.J.

"I'm not religious. I believe in science," said my TV and film costume designer friend Jennifer in a recent conversation. I asked her what she meant, and she responded, "I'm not smart enough to understand it all, but I trust in a system that values rational evaluation." I'm not exactly surprised by how many people regard religion and science as two opposing forces. We all remember that unfortunate tiff the church had with Galileo. (But we can't forget Rome did apologize -- sure, it may have taken a few centuries, but it's the thought that counts, right?) So, yes, I agree, there are some complications in the relationship between science and faith, but generalizing Catholicism as science-phobic just doesn't sit well with me ... almost as much as the idea that faith doesn't value rational evaluation.

Now, I'm not trying to get into one of those debates Christopher Hitchens used to have with religious people. It's just, particularly as a Jesuit, I feel like I should make a PSA to clear a few things up. To put it simply, we LOVE science. (Well, not me personally -- I'm definitely more of a humanities guy. There's a reason I'm working in the entertainment industry and not teaching organic chem. But on the whole, as a group, there are plenty of us who just can't get enough of equations, theorems, and the like.) Still not convinced? OK. That Big Bang theory Christians supposedly hate? A Jesuit came up with it [1]. The first mathematically correct theory of flight? That was a Jesuit, too [2]. This year's Carl Sagan Medal award recipient? You guessed it! Another Jesuit!

The award's recipient, Br. Guy Consolmagno, works at the Vatican Observatory, a center whose mere existence some find perplexing. The church actually has a long history with astronomy, initially constructing the Gregorian Tower in 1580 so Jesuit Fr. Christoph Clavius could collect data to create the Gregorian calendar we use today. Since Clavius, there's been a long line of Jesuit astronomers. Indeed, there are over 30 craters on the moon named after Jesuits. (They were the ones making the maps, so are you surprised?) Since the 1930s, the pope has entrusted the Vatican Observatory to us, and Jesuits continue to work in the observatory's headquarters in Italy and, more recently, in its second location in Arizona (a place with a lot less light pollution than Rome), mapping the universe, studying meteorites and asteroids and, yes, looking for signs of extraterrestrial life.

Side note: I absolutely love space. As a kid, I'd rush home after 5 p.m. Mass at St. Rita's to catch "Space: 1999." I waited in line several times for "Star Wars," and I was thrilled to read Mary Doria Russell's The Sparrow about Jesuits in space [3]. Of course it's probably telling that it's stories about space that captivate me, not necessarily the science. But I think the same sense of wonder that excites people who love space stories is the same kind of wonder that excites those who spend their lifetime studying its scientific intricacies.

Brother Guy put it well when my team and I interviewed him for this week's video: "Looking at the sky reminds you that there's more to the universe than what's for lunch." Indeed, there's something so universal about looking up on a clear night, exclaiming, "Wow!" and letting yourself imagine the infinite possibilities. As Guy says, "Looking at the stars and wondering what they are about and how we fit in -- that is something that makes us human."

Now back to this idea that you can't be religious and scientific. There's this assumption out there held by many nonreligious AND religious folks that if you're religious, you believe you have all the answers and you end up abandoning all rational evaluation and curiosity. OK, I'm a priest with degrees in theology and philosophy, and I'll be the first to admit I don't have all the answers. (On my best days, I'll have ONE answer, if I'm lucky.) And why would I abandon rational evaluation using the mind God gave me? Indeed, the more you know, the deeper you go into your relationship with God, the more you realize you simply don't know. Brother Guy said it well at a talk at the Mount Street Jesuit Centre in London:

Faith is not accepting a bunch of facts in the absence of evidence. It is making choices in the absence of all the facts ... whether it is your choice of school, or job, who you will marry, where you will live. When you made those choices, there was no way you could know how it would turn out. That's life, making choices in the absence of sufficient data. But you make these choices in the expectation that things will turn out well. That's faith. Sometimes that expectation is going to be shattered, but you go ahead anyway; what else can you do? For Brother Guy and the other Jesuit scientists, their faith doesn't dictate what facts to believe. Their faith gives them the reason to go looking to try to understand those facts. Healthy faith requires curiosity and doubt, and so does good science. "Science is not the facts, it's the conversation," he says. In order to go deeper into spirituality or science, you have to get comfortable with mystery and resist the temptation for black-and-white simplification.

I write all this acknowledging that I'm neither a theologian nor a scientist, but that's the beauty of spirit and science: No one's excluded. We're all permitted to wonder, to "converse," about these things and consider our place in it all. I suppose the same is true for good storytelling. If I produce a compelling film, the opportunity for it to resonate shouldn't be reserved for a select few.

In a world where technology is king (it seemed like discussion about the new iPhone 6 momentarily trumped the Islamic State, Ebola, and immigration on Tuesday) and so many feel like they must choose between science and spirituality, the Vatican Observatory is worth learning about. Give the video a look, and let's remember those Jesuit scientists the next time we come across one of those fundamentalist religious types who says science is a farce. But let's also think of them the next time someone tells us they have all the answers in science and have no need for spirit.

And if you'll permit me, consider going outside tonight and looking up at that mysterious sky and indulge in a little wonder! If you're feeling particularly adventurous, you may want to think of this quote by Jesuit scientist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: "Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire."

Science and faith as two opposing forces? I don't think so.

Kasper presses for full return of those in second marriages

Robert McClory
National Catholic Reporter
September 11, 2014

In a long and complex article in the Sept. 15 issue of America magazine, Cardinal Walter Kasper discusses how mercy is understood in the Gospel and in the teaching of Pope Francis. He applies this to the possibility of permitting those in second marriages to be absolved and returned to the church in good standing. This issue is now under discussion in preparation for the upcoming synod, Kasper says, and it is clear he will be one of those pushing enthusiastically for change in the near future.

Here are a few telling paragraphs from Kasper's powerful article.

The Gospel is against a legalistic understanding of canon law. Canon law should be interpreted and applied in the light of mercy because mercy opens our eyes to the concrete situation of the other. Mercy shows that the individual is not only a case that can subsumed under a general rule. On the contrary, it is essential for Christian anthropology that before God we are not a "plural"; every person and every situation is singular. So we have to find solutions that are just and equitable at the same time. If we do not, then -- as the Romans put it -- summa ius (highest justice) can become summa iniuria (highest injustice).

What such reflections mean for the question of divorced and remarried Catholics is now under discussion in advance of the forthcoming Synod of Bishops. I do not have a final answer on this question. It is the responsibility of the synod together with the pope to make these decisions. In my last consistory with the pope, however, I did with his agreement propose some modest reflections on this urgent issue.

No theologian, not even the pope, can change the doctrine of the indissolubility of a sacramental marriage. On the contrary, we all have reason to help and support people to be faithful to marriage for their own good and for the good of their children. So doctrine cannot be changed and will not be changed. But doctrine must be applied with prudence in a just and equitable way to concrete and often complex situations. For these situations are very different. There is no one typical case of divorce and remarriage; therefore there cannot be one standard solution for every situation. Discernment is needed, and discernment, prudence and wisdom are the main virtues for a bishop as a pastor. The best cannot always be done, but we should always do the best possible.

So the question is: If a person after divorce enters into a civil second marriage but then repents of his failure to fulfill what he promised before God, his partner and the church in the first marriage, and carries out as well as possible his new duties and does what he can for the Christian education of his children and has a serious desire for the sacraments, which he needs for strength in his difficult situation, can we after a time of new orientation and stabilization deny absolution and forgiveness? In the Creed we profess: "I believe in the forgiveness of sin." When God gives a new chance, a new future to everybody who repents and does what is possible in their situation, why not the church, which is the sacrament of God's mercy? ...

The customary perspective in theology starts from above. We know a doctrine or a rule, and we start from there in order to apply it to concrete reality, which is usually complex and manifold. Mercy leads us to a different perspective, to start not from above but from below, to undertake a consideration of a concrete situation to which we are applying the law or rule. This is not situation ethics, because the rule is valuable in itself and is not constituted by the situation. This is the method taught by St. Ignatius Loyola in his spiritual exercises; this is how Pope Francis, as a good Jesuit, practices it. He starts from the situation and then undertakes a discernment of the spirits.

Diocese of Winona request for change of venue denied

Winona Daily News
September 9, 2014

The Diocese of Winona's request to move the civil suit over a former priest accused of abuse has been denied.

The diocese had argued that the lawsuit couldn't be fairly tried in Ramsey County District Court, and had requested that it be moved. A three-judge state court of appeals panel disagreed in a ruling released Wednesday, concluding that the district court's earlier dismissal of the change of venue claim was justified.

The case is scheduled to go to trial Nov 3. The plaintiff, a Twin Cities man identified only as John Doe 1, is seeking unspecified financial damages on negligence claims and the disclosure of more documents on a public nuisance claim. He has claimed to have been sexually abused by Thomas Adamson, a former Winona diocese and Archdiocese of St. Paul-Minneapolis priest, nearly 40 years ago.

That public nuisance claim was also disputed by the diocese, which sought to dismiss it. Earlier this month, the Ramsey County judge presiding over the case, John Van de North, declined to dismiss the suit, clearing the way for it to reach trial. It will be the first clerical sexual abuse case nationwide to use the public nuisance theory at trial, attorneys for the plaintiff have said. The public nuisance claim has already led to the unprecedented disclosure of tens of thousands of church documents and the names of dozens of accused priests.

Adamson, who admitted in his own deposition for the Doe 1 case that he abused around a dozen teens from the 1960s to the mid-1980s, was removed from active ministry in 1985 and defrocked in 2009. He was never criminally charged but has been the subject of previous lawsuits by other victims.

Communion for the remarried: Francis has a yes "in picture"

Sandro Magister
Chiesa
September 8, 2014

ROME, September 8, 2014 – The latest to call for a radical change in the Church's practice and doctrine on marriage is the Belgian bishop of Antwerp, Johan Jozef Bonny.

He did so in early September with a thirty-page memorandum in multiple languages, which he also sent to Pope Francis.

Because the presumed support of Jorge Mario Bergoglio is inevitably part of the arguments of the cardinals, bishops, and theologians who are calling for the change, which would mean granting Eucharistic communion to the divorced and remarried: a key argument of the synod of bishops on the family set to have its first session in Rome this October.

Pope Francis has never said explicitly what his position is in the dispute - to which he intentionally gave free rein - between the proponents and opponents of the change.

When, for example, he defended in strong words the encyclical of Paul VI "Humanae Vitae," he disappointed the innovators, who see that very encyclical as an emblem of the disastrous detachment of the magisterium of the Church from the spirit of the times and the practice of the faithful themselves.

But on the contrary there are are increasingly numerous testimonies on how Bergoglio, as an archbishop, encouraged his priests to give communion to the cohabiting and remarried. He himself, as pope, spoke by telephone last April with a civilly divorced and remarried woman of Buenos Aires and advised her to “go receive communion in another parish if her pastor did not give it to her.” This according to the woman's account, which has not been refuted.

In any case, there is evidence for the idea that Pope Francis leans more to the side of the innovators in the appreciation that he has repeatedly expressed for Cardinal Walter Kasper, foremost among supporters of the change, whom he charged with introducing the discussion on the theme of the family at the consistory of cardinals last February.

The charge given to Kasper was itself enough to mark a turning point. In the early 1990's the German cardinal, who at the time was the bishop of Rottenberg, together with bishop of Mainz Karl Lehmann and of Freiburg Oskar Saier was the protagonist of a memorable clash with the then-prefect of the congregation for the doctrine of the faith, Joseph Ratzinger, precisely on the question of communion for the divorced and remarried. The clash ended with a victory for Ratzinger, who had the full support of John Paul II. And for a couple of decades Kasper didn't say any more on the topic. But since Bergoglio has been pope, the 81-year-old cardinal has gone back to the front lines to present his ideas, this time with the manifest support of the successor of Peter.

Bishop Bonny, before being assigned to the Belgian diocese of Antwerp in 2009, had been a close collaborator of Kasper at the pontifical council for Christian unity, headed by the cardinal. And in the memorandum with which he is now calling for change not only in the practice but also in the doctrine of the Church on marriage, citations of Pope Francis abound. All interpreted in favor of the change.

This brings up the question: up to what point is it plausible to assign Francis to the camp of the innovators, on the question of communion for the remarried? And if this convergence exists, is it just superficial or of substance?

This question is answered by a theologian who has already spoken out on this website to illustrate the innovations of method in the most representative document of pope Bergoglio, "Evangelii Gaudium": Paul-Anthony McGavin of Australia (in the photo), age 70, a priest of the archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn and an ecclesiastical assistant at the University of Canberra.

McGavin leans toward a change and does not conceal his agreement with Kasper's positions. But this is not what he has written about. He instead dedicates his essay to demonstrating the affinity between the proposals of innovation and the “methodology” of Francis, intolerant of any "closed system," whether pastoral or doctrinal.

According to McGavin, Ratzinger also had an equally “open” methodology. And in the initial part of his essay he amply develops this affinity between the two most recent popes. To the point that the reader is induced to think that Francis is preparing to realize what Benedict XVI had also been predisposed to do.

But it is on the reigning pope that expectations are focused. Because in the end, after the two synods, it will be he who decides the path to take, on marriage in general and on communion for the remarried in particular.

A path of pastoral innovation, if not also doctrinal, that - according to McGavin's arguments - Francis already has in mind.

Documents show Twin Cities archdiocese protected priest accused of sexual abuse

Madeleine Baran
Minnesota Public Radio
September 5, 2014

Leaders of the Twin Cities archdiocese kept a priest in ministry despite sexual contact with women under his pastoral care and didn't report allegations of child sex abuse to police, according to documents released today in a clergy abuse lawsuit.

More than 1,000 pages from internal files show how church leaders protected the Rev. Richard Jeub for decades. The documents detail allegations that Jeub sexually abused two teenage girls and sexually exploited vulnerable women under his care. Jeub, 74, retired in 2002 - twenty years after the archdiocese received the first complaint against him. He moved to the Duluth area, where he failed to persuade the Catholic diocese to allow him to assist in parishes. No records exist of any reports to police. It's illegal in Minnesota for a priest to have sexual contact with someone under his pastoral or counseling care.

In a 1989 memo, the Rev. Kevin McDonough, who would later serve as vicar general, told Archbishop John Roach that one of Jeub's accusers "is being advised to file criminal and/or civil action against Father Jeub."

McDonough wrote, "As you know, sexual exploitation by a therapist, including a clergy person in a therapeutic role, is a felony in Minnesota ... There is no reporting requirement around this statute (unlike in the case of sexual abuse of minors or vulnerable adults) and, therefore, we are under no obligation to file a criminal complaint against Jeub."

Attorney Jeff Anderson released the documents as part of a lawsuit filed on behalf of man who claims the Rev. Thomas Adamson sexually abused him in the 1970s. The lawsuit accuses the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis and the Diocese of Winona of creating a public nuisance by keeping information on abusive priests secret. Anderson released similar files on several other priests earlier this year.

Anderson has said he will continue to release files as he prepares to take the case to trial in Ramsey County District Court on Nov. 3.

In a statement to MPR News, Auxiliary Bishop Andrew Cozzens said Jeub was removed from ministry because of the allegations.

"We don't have knowledge of whether police were called," Cozzens wrote. "None of the people involved are here now and the documents don't give an explanation."

Archbishop John Nienstedt "has reconsidered these allegations and has determined that they may constitute sexual abuse of a minor," Cozzens said. "Jeub's laicization case is currently in process."

Nienstedt named Jeub in December 2013 on a list of "priests with credible claims against them of sexual abuse of a minor."

Two women have claimed Jeub sexually abused them as teenagers. The archdiocese reached a settlement with one of the women. The other woman turned down a settlement and demanded a jury trial. The jury sided with the priest, according to news accounts at the time. Court records for the case have been destroyed.

In a separate case in 1995, a woman sued the archdiocese, Jeub and St. Richard and St. Kevin parishes, alleging that Jeub sexually abused her while he served as her counselor from about 1980 to 1990.

The woman, who is not identified in the lawsuit, said that Jeub visited her family in 1980 while her husband was suffering from a heart problem. The priest then began providing marital counseling to her, according to the lawsuit. During that time, Jeub initiated "unpermitted, harmful and offensive sexual contact" with her, the lawsuit said. The woman filed for divorce in 1981, and the sexual contact continued until 1990, according to the suit.

Jeub acknowledged, in his written response to the lawsuit, "that during the period from 1980 to 1990 he hugged and kissed plaintiff with her permission and told her that he loved her," according to the court record. He denied the abuse claims. The lawsuit was settled for an undisclosed amount in 1995.

Jeub could not be reached for comment. Earlier this year, he told MPR News, "My offense, apparently, as far as I know, is that I kissed a 16-year-old at her birthday party, uninvited, in front of her friends. It was embarrassing. It was inappropriate. It was stupid."

"I also had a 17-year-old who I was seeing on a regular basis because she came from a troubled home," he said. "She would come in and talk to me. And we usually ended with a hug. One time I kissed her. ... Those are the two offenses against me. And inclusion in that list takes a big black brush and paints everybody with the same brush and that bothers me." He said he is not being monitored by the archdiocese.

Documents show the cover-up

The documents released today provide another detailed look at the tactics used by church leaders to protect priests accused of sexual abuse.

In 1982, the archdiocese received its first documented complaint against Jeub. In a Dec. 6, 1982 letter, the Rev. Ronald Bowers, a chancery official, responded to the man who made the complaint.

"In your letter, you make reference to Father Richard Jeub, proposing that he may not always have been discreet in his dealings with your former daughter-in-law," Bowers wrote. "You express concern about his personal and professional behavior ... We have a process conducted here within the Archbishop's offices by which we are able to discuss matters such as this with individual priests. But, we cannot begin that process without your consent, since the information you shared with the Tribunal is carefully protected by the Tribunal's own understanding of confidentiality which, as you can guess, is a rather strict understanding of the word."

The files do not indicate whether the archdiocese pursued the claim.

In 1987, Roach, the archbishop, received a letter from a woman who said she was sexually abused by Jeub for about six years from 1976 to 1982 when she sought "pastoral help" from Jeub as an adult. "I am tired of keeping his secret and protecting him anymore," the woman wrote.

The woman met with the Rev. Robert Carlson, now the Archbishop of St. Louis, about her complaint. Carlson summarized the meeting in a June 17, 1987 memo to Roach. He said the woman went to Jeub for counseling "and it moved quickly into friendship and sexual contact. There is no doubt in my mind, but that this woman is truthful and, because of her dependent relationship to counseling, Father Jeub was able to develop a relationship with her which involved touching, kissing, fondling and, eventually, masturbation."

The woman said she helped Jeub "dispose of" pornography, borrowed money from him to buy a car, and "felt real dependency on Father Jeub as priest, counselor, friend, loan officer, father figure and somehow God has been mixed up in all of it."

Carlson said he told the woman that he believed her and would confront the priest.

Jeub "did not deny the charges," Carlson wrote in an Aug. 13, 1987 memo to Roach. "It is my opinion, Archbishop, that Father Jeub has a pretty good understanding of the seriousness of this and is a good candidate for some therapy and study at this time."

The woman, whose name has been redacted, told the archdiocese that she had tried to confront Jeub directly - but that he didn't seem to realize that he had done anything wrong.

In a handwritten letter, the woman told Jeub, "You exploited me the first time you stopped focusing on what I was talking about and started focusing on how near your hand was to my breast and wondering how you could touch it. It hurts to realize how you took advantage of my vulnerability."

She continued, "I lost a lot in being exploited by you. I lost my self-respect, my integrity. I lost the sense of my sexuality being good and valuable. I struggle to trust God and prayer again. I'm angry at the Church for letting you get away with such behavior."

Jeub replied: "You raise a part of our relationship that I have had no comfort about either. I am extremely sorry for and deeply saddened by the pain and mistrust of yourself and your goodness that I have been party to. I never intended anything of that sort, but the proverb says the road to hell is paved that way."

He wrote, "I can only ask your forgiveness today for what was done in weakness and stupidity," adding that he wondered "if we weren't both co-dependent at that time."

Roach sent Jeub for a psychological evaluation at a treatment center for clergy in New Mexico run by the Servants of the Paraclete. Jeub told clinicians that he had "struggled to convert sexuality from a dirty thing to something beautiful" and that "I've always had a Messiah complex. Instances of the respect and power people bestow on the ordained, have left me awe-struck. It is a good way of spending time, energy, life," according to the center's report.

Jeub admitted sexual contact "with less than a dozen women, usually things became inappropriate when sexual behaviors outside our relationship became a counseling subject ... I have found myself in sexually awkward situations that I've handled well, others poorly. I hope I respect myself and woman. In principle, anything like exploitation, I find disgusting, although, I may have been guilty of it at times."

Jeub acknowledged that he was sent to the facility because of his contact with a young woman in the early 1970s. He counseled the woman and they became friends, he said. "Unfortunately, an affectionate masturbatory relation was also occasionally part of it," he said.

According to the facility's evaluation, Jeub engaged in a "triangular erotic friendship" with two young women at his parish beginning in 1972 or 1973. The contact involved "touching only, not intercourse."

Jeub also admitted to "a number of other sexual involvements, again usually touching only, but at least on one occasion with intercourse, these relationships creating no public problems and some of them continuing to the present as friendships," the report said. "He has suffered some guilt about these relationships but has tended to justify them to himself by thinking of them as helping relationships in which he was committed to the women's welfare."

While at the treatment center, Jeub admitted that he was still in a relationship with another woman, and that he was reluctant to end it because of concern about her health.

A psychologist at the center recommended "intensive residential placement" and expressed concern about Jeub's alleged pattern of seeking out needy women.

"They have all started with him being in a helping or counseling role, which extended to friendship and ultimately resulted in some sexual contact ..." the psychologist wrote. "In addition, it cannot be overlooked that becoming involved in friendships, not to mention the sexual relationship, after being in a professional relationship of a counselor, is generally considered unethical."

When Jeub returned from New Mexico, he moved into a rectory but wasn't assigned as a pastor. Roach sent Jeub to local therapist Gary Schoener, who had evaluated other priests accused of abuse. Schoener disagreed with the center's recommendations.

Jeub wouldn't be "a candidate for psychotherapy per se," Schoener wrote in an April 1988 report.

"It is my belief that Father Jeub, as he has gotten older, has become more aware of, or experienced drives for 'family' and sex which would be normal for a layperson to be able to satisfy by being married," he concluded.

Jeub acknowledged that his "needs" have "grown over time," Schoener wrote.

"Having tasted the 'forbidden fruit,' he has liked it, basically."

Schoener said Jeub's problem was primarily spiritual and recommended that he seek help from a spiritual director to decide whether to remain in the priesthood.

In a 1988 letter to Roach, the Rev. Michael O'Connell, another chancery official, said a church investigation "found that Father Jeub has admitted to being in other relationships of this kind, possibly as many as anywhere from 5-10 as a conservative estimate."

O'Connell added, "The parts that are especially troubling regarding Fr. Jeub's situation are that he continues to seem to not appreciate the kind of risk that could be associated with this kind of behavior both to adult women whom he may meet in the future and also the legal aspects of those risks."

Jeub agreed not to provide counseling to women, and O'Connell recommended to Roach that the priest receive counseling for himself instead.

Roach agreed. "I think that right now Jeub is dangerous to himself and to others without that kind of counseling," Roach wrote in a May 5, 1988 memo to O'Connell.

Concerns about possible crimes, and more complaints

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, more complaints surfaced. Documents show that church leaders knew that some of the alleged behavior could be illegal.

In 1989, McDonough, the chancery official, met with Jeub and one of the women with whom he had admitted to having an inappropriate relationship. McDonough reminded Roach that Minnesota law doesn't require church officials to report sexual exploitation of an adult by a priest.

In December 1989, another woman reported that Jeub made sexual advances toward her. "This is now the fifth victim of Father Jeub we are aware of," McDonough wrote in a memo to Roach. "The pattern is exactly the same: women in their late twenties or early thirties who are emotionally distressed. It is now absolutely clear that Jeub has something bigger than a celibacy problem here."

Roach replied, "The situation with Dick Jeub is sad. I don't see much alternative other than your continuing to work with him in the hope that she can see the reasonableness of terminating that relationship."

In 1990, a church official told Roach that Jeub appeared to have used a charity fund at his parish to funnel money to a woman who was struggling with her mortgage. Jeub had donated money to the fund and then withdrawn it and given it to the woman, according to Carlson, the church official.

Roach was bothered by the latest charge. In a Feb. 1, 1990 to the Rev. Austin Ward, who managed the archdiocese's finances, Roach said he was "nervous" about the report.

"If Father Jeub is making a gift to the parish and then, in fact, is giving those funds to another person, it seems to me that at the very least it's a tax dodge, and perhaps more seriously, it is a misuse of parish funds," Roach wrote.

The next several pages are blacked out.

Another evaluation - and another warning

In 1990, Roach sent Jeub to St. Luke Institute, a clergy treatment center in Maryland, for another evaluation.

In a referral letter, McDonough explained that Jeub "has been involved in at least five relationships in which he has engaged in sexual exploitation or made unsuccessful advances towards sexual exploitation. In each case the people involved were adult women in their late twenties or early thirties who were in a time of particular stress."

Clinicians at St. Luke Institute found that Jeub "is immature, has a striking lack of empathy in regard to the effect of his actions on others, and has a real lack of effective boundaries," McDonough told Roach in a 1990 memo.

The staff "believes that he is at high risk for repeat offending," McDonough wrote.

"In fact, the psychiatrist said that the staff was willing to say about Jeub what they would say about very few other people: they guarantee that he will re-offend, that after breaking up the relationship with [redacted] he will take on another exploitative relationship as soon as he meets the right kind of vulnerable woman.

"They are not confident about Father Jeub's susceptibility to treatment. Because of his intellectual strength, he is very well defensed and his lack of empathy is a real barrier. They believe that the only possibility for successful treatment is in an inpatient setting, and have recommended that that take place at St. Luke's."

Roach agreed with the recommendation.

Jeub did not. "None of these relationships primarily or initially involved appointments, formal requests for counseling or such," he wrote in a letter to the archdiocese.

The priest objected to the clinicians' opinion that he was still "at risk" of misconduct.

"Are we ever not at risk?" Jeub wrote. "Learning by our mistakes is a brutal school and many have suffered in my education thus far. I hope, and intend, never to be responsible for another's suffering the way I've inflicted emotional and spiritual pain and harm on the women I consciously cared for yet acted so harmfully toward."

Meanwhile, McDonough met with two adult children whose mother allegedly had a sexual relationship with Jeub.

McDonough told Roach that he reassured the woman's children "that we were doing whatever we could to try to break up the relationship."

He said he tried to explain sexual exploitation to the woman's children.

"I told them that sometimes these relationships with people become all knotted up like a ball of twine," McDonough wrote. "One's temptation is to pull hard on the two ends to separate the string, but that only tangles it tighter. We are trying to use a more thorough but slightly slower process. They seem to understand and accept that."

Jeub resigned from St. Kevin in 1990 amid concerns about possible lawsuits.

One of many accused priests

Jeub was just one of dozens of priests accused of sexual misconduct, and the files show that his case overlapped with others. He crossed paths with other accused priests while in treatment at St. Luke Institute in Maryland in 1990. The following year, McDonough accidentally used another accused priest's name in a letter to an alleged victim of Jeub.

"First of all, let me indicate again my embarrassment at my miscommunication with" the woman, McDonough wrote in a memo to the archdiocese's victims' advocate. "As I have indicated to you, I had gotten the mistaken notion in my mind that she was a victim of Fr. Michael Kolar."

Jeub met other abusive priests at Twin Cities clergy support groups. In 1992, he asked McDonough if he could work alongside the Rev. Michael Stevens, a priest who had pleaded guilty to child sexual abuse. Jeub said he had met Stevens at a "priest support" meeting and Stevens talked about his work at a Catholic education center.

Although the archdiocese did not object to Stevens' work with the center, it did object to Jeub's proposed involvement.

Instead, Jeub found work in 1994 "providing office support for a development project of the Catholic Youth Camps Inc," according to another memo from McDonough to Roach.

Allegations of child sexual abuse

In 1990, the archdiocese learned of allegations that Jeub had sexual contact with a teenage girl. McDonough told Roach that a woman said Jeub "engaged her in some sexual contact" when she was 13 or 14. "She did not specify the extent of the sexual contact," McDonough wrote.

The woman said the abuse began when she went to Jeub for confession. Jeub offered to drive her home and kissed her in a hallway. Jeub "did not caress her breasts but he held her above and below her breasts," McDonough wrote. The woman reported two other sexual incidents with Jeub, according to McDonough.

Another woman came forward to the archdiocese in 1991 to allege abuse by Jeub as a teenager. McDonough met with the woman, who told him that she had tried to kill herself twice when she was a teenager. McDonough told Roach in a memo that the woman said her suicide attempts were "explicitly aimed at showing Father Jeub how badly he was hurting her."

When some of the women threatened to sue, reporters learned of the abuse complaints. One of the cases went to a jury in 1995, and Jeub was found not guilty.

After the jury verdict, McDonough pushed for Jeub to return to ministry. "Jeub has been deprived of his ministry for five years, which is a fairly heavy punishment, probably heavier than would have been laid against him in other professions," McDonough told Roach in a May 10, 1995 memo.

Roach sent the case to the archdiocese's clergy review board, a group that advised the archbishop on abuse cases. Roach retired in 1995, and his replacement, Archbishop Harry Flynn, received the board's recommendation that Jeub return to ministry with some restrictions.

Before returning Jeub to ministry, Flynn sent him for another psychiatric evaluation. Dr. Robert Barron diagnosed the priest with a sexual disorder and issued a report that said he found it "impossible to accurately predict with sufficient accuracy whether client may be prone to future sexual acting out behavior."

The priest "does not believe that non-needy women are at risk because he tends to be more attracted to vulnerable ones," Barron wrote.

Chancery officials reviewed Barron's report and worried that some of the alleged victims might still be able to file lawsuits. In an Aug. 21, 1996 memo to Flynn and McDonough, Sister Dominica Brennan asked, "With regard to these instances, might complaints still be filed, or has the statute run? If Father were given some form of public ministry, would that draw attention to him which might lead to such a complaint?"

Documents show that McDonough checked the dates and determined that at least one of the women would no longer be able to sue.

Flynn assigns Jeub to work with a priest later accused of child sex abuse

In 1997, Flynn assigned Jeub to serve as parochial vicar of Sacred Heart in Robbinsdale. However, Jeub quickly ran into problems with the parish priest, the Rev. Robert Zasacki.

In a letter to the archdiocese, Zasacki detailed his complaints. He recounted an incident before Sunday Mass in which Jeub had "noticed that the back of the dress of the female lector was open three or four or five buttons. Dick immediately got up and went over to the woman and began buttoning her dress. I waited a day and a half to see if Dick would have any comment about this. He didn't. So, I brought the subject up and told him that I was surprised at that behavior. I stated that the buttoning of a woman's dress was an act of intimacy and one which I felt was inappropriate for a priest to do ... What concerns me is the lack of a sense of boundaries on the part of Fr. Jeub and the complete absence of impulse control."

Jeub resigned from the parish. Flynn later removed Zasacki from ministry for alleged child sexual abuse.

Flynn assigned Jeub as parochial vicar at St. John in Little Canada and, in 1999, as parochial administrator of Sacred Heart-St. Lawrence in Faribault.

When the national clergy sex abuse scandal broke in 2002, Jeub retired from ministry. However, he later claimed that he had been forced out and asked to be reinstated. Flynn refused.

Jeub wrote angry letters to Flynn complaining of his treatment. He denied sexually abusing children. "You continue to slander me by applying the sanctions laid on those guilty of child abuse ..." Jeub wrote in a Nov. 6, 2006 letter to Flynn. "In my moral theology, slander was a mean, vicious and sinful activity."

He continued, "You seem almost obsessed about possible reactions from the faithful and the press. The first person that I shared your letter with was initially speechless, then used the words 'appalling' and 'totally disrespectful.'

He added, "One priest put it quite bluntly to mutual friends, 'Dick's getting screwed.'"

Jeub has not returned to ministry since his retirement in 2002, according to the archdiocese.

Police inquiry into Los Banos priest could take months

Rob Parsons
Merced Sun Star
September 4, 2014

An investigation into allegations of a Los Banos Catholic priest possibly possessing child pornography could take at least three more months to complete, the Los Banos Police Department said Thursday.

Cmdr. Jason Hedden said a forensic examination of computers seized from the home and office of the Rev. Robert E. Gamel will take much longer than initially anticipated.

“There’s an overwhelming amount of information and computer files that they have to go through,” Hedden said. “The detectives also have look at the files in way that doesn’t violate (confidential) information.”

Priests enjoy “confessional privilege,” which protects the confidentiality of certain conversations between a clergyman and a church member. Officers are working with an attorney, known as a “special master,” to examine the computers without infringing on protected information.

Gamel, 64, has been under investigation since Aug. 14, when church officials told police the head of St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Los Banos may have obtained from the Internet nude photographs of a teenage parishioner, according to court records obtained by the Merced Sun-Star.

Gamel, who is commonly known around Los Banos as “Father Bob,” has not been arrested or formally accused by law enforcement of wrongdoing.

The Sun-Star reached Gamel on Thursday by telephone, asking for his side of the story. He declined to comment, referring questions to his Fresno-based attorney, Roger Litman.

Litman also declined to discuss the investigation. “I think it’s not appropriate to make any comment at this point,” Litman told the Sun-Star. “Obviously, the truth is going to come out and when we find if there are going to be any charges filed or not, then we’ll be in a better position to have some kind of comment.”

Gamel has moved from St. Joseph’s Catholic Church’s rectory in the 1600 block of Center Street in Los Banos but has not been taken out of the area. Church officials have repeatedly said Gamel was transferred to another location where no children are present.

Teresa Dominguez, chancellor for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Fresno, on Thursday clarified the church’s statements, saying no minors are present around Gamel “who are entrusted to the care of adult supervision being provided by church personnel and/or designated adult volunteers,” Dominguez said in an email to the Sun-Star.

Dominguez said the diocese never claimed Gamel had been transferred out of Los Banos. “The Diocese of Fresno stated that Fr. Gamel was relocated to a location where there are no minors present during the course of the investigation. We did not state whether or not this was within or outside of the city of Los Banos,” Dominguez said in the email.

Police said the diocese in Fresno has been “extremely cooperative” and “helpful” during the investigation, noting that Dominguez and another church official, Cheryl Sarkisian, were the first to inform police of the allegations and did so within hours of receiving a complaint from the teenager’s family. Police said Gamel also continues to cooperate with investigators.

Police on Aug. 15 seized a laptop, computer tower, CDs and a brown box containing nearly 20 DVDs, many involving erotic-themed male muscle and bodybuilding films, according to a copy of a search warrant affidavit obtained by the Sun-Star.

The affidavit describes a pattern of behavior involving Gamel and young men that made others in the church “uncomfortable.” Allegations described include hugging a young male in a single-person restroom, rubbing the back of a sleeping teenager and touching young males on their shoulders, arms and chest.

Church officials have sent letters to members of the other eight California churches in which Gamel served since he was ordained in 1990, asking members to come forward if they have any information about the case.

Catholic dioceses fight over Archbishop Sheen's body

David Gibson
Religion News Service
September 4, 2014


NEW YORK (RNS) In life, Archbishop Fulton Sheen was exceptional, a riveting Catholic preacher on radio who outpolled star comedian Milton Berle in the early days of television, winning two Emmys and a following that was the envy of Bible-thumping Protestants.

After his death in 1979, it was no surprise that Sheen would be pushed for sainthood. But now two bishops have clashed in an unusual public dispute over who holds claim to Sheen’s body: the Archdiocese of New York, where he is buried, or the Diocese of Peoria, where he was raised and ordained.

The fight between Illinois Bishop Daniel Jenky and Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York erupted into public view on Wednesday (Sept. 3), when Jenky issued a statement blasting the New York archdiocese for thwarting Sheen’s expected beatification next year by reneging on an agreement to return the late archbishop’s body to Peoria.

“Bishop Jenky was personally assured on several occasions by the Archdiocese of New York that the transfer of the body would take place at the appropriate time,” the Diocese of Peoria said in a statement.

The statement said that senior Vatican officials were set to approve a miracle attributed to Sheen’s intervention — the revival after an hour of a stillborn baby — clearing the way for him to be beatified in a few months, the final step before formal canonization, which would require a second miracle.

Rome expected that Sheen’s body would be transferred from the crypt under St. Patrick’s Cathedral, where he is buried, to Peoria to collect relics from the body, the Illinois diocese said. Peoria has been in charge of Sheen’s cause for canonization since it was opened in 2002. In 2012, then-Pope Benedict XVI declared Sheen “venerable,” a requisite first step before beatification.

But the Archdiocese of New York denied Jenky’s request to move the body and “after further discussion with Rome, it was decided that the Sheen Cause would now have to be relegated to the Congregation’s historic archive.”

In other words, Sheen’s cause for sainthood has been indefinitely suspended — an outcome that left Jenky “heartbroken” and apparently fuming, judging by the tenor of the statement and the fact that he went public with his complaint against Dolan.

On Thursday, the Archdiocese of New York rejected Jenky’s claims and said it would be happy to take over Sheen’s cause if Peoria balks.

Dolan’s spokesman, Joseph Zwilling, noted in a statement that Sheen’s own wish was to be buried in St. Patrick’s and that his closest surviving relatives also want him to remain there.

Zwilling said Peoria and New York officials focused on two areas: exhuming Sheen’s body and collecting so-called first-class relics — any remaining locks of hair or parts of Sheen’s body.

While Sheen’s family did agree to exhumation, “regarding first-class relics, Cardinal Dolan does object to the dismemberment of the archbishop’s body,” Zwilling said.

He said that it was Jenky’s decision to shelve Sheen’s cause and that if the Vatican approves, “the Archdiocese of New York would welcome the opportunity to assume responsibility for the cause in an attempt to move it forward.”

How or whether this fight over Sheen can be settled is unclear. Dolan is a cardinal and past president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and he has influence in the American hierarchy and in Rome that Jenky can’t match.

The Vatican department in charge of advancing Sheen’s cause of sainthood said in a statement Thursday (Sept. 4) it “does not believe that this will be a lasting impediment.” But it added that “it depends upon negotiations between others.”

Still, this sort of fight is bad publicity for the Catholic Church, and it’s hard to imagine that the American bishops would want to be seen as stomping on sainthood for a candidate like Sheen, who remains remarkably popular even decades after his death.

“We are incredibly saddened and confused by the Archdiocese of New York’s decision to not cooperate with the Sheen Foundation on the cause,” said Bonnie Engstrom, whose son, now almost 4 years old and thriving, was stillborn during a birth at the family’s home in Goodfield, Ill., which is part of the Peoria diocese.

When the baby — named James Fulton Engstrom — was born with no pulse, Bonnie Engstrom just sat on her bedroom floor saying Sheen’s name over and over. “That was about as close to a prayer I could get,” she told the National Catholic Register. Her husband, Travis, performed an emergency baptism while waiting for the ambulance, and even at the emergency room the baby was not reviving. Some 61 minutes had passed since his birth and doctors were about to declare the infant dead when he started breathing like a healthy newborn.

The parents were warned that he would have suffered serious organ damage from the lack of oxygen, but he has been fine. Last March, a seven-member team of medical experts gathered by the Vatican concluded there there is no natural explanation for the child’s survival. The cardinals in Rome were expected to confirm it as a miracle attributable to Sheen’s intervention.

Sheen stood out among Catholic clergy almost from the time he was ordained in 1916.

He was a star student in theology in Europe and taught theology and philosophy for years at Catholic University of America in Washington.

He also had an appealing youthful appearance complemented by piercing eyes and a powerful voice, and the weekly Sunday night radio broadcast he began in 1930, “The Catholic Hour,” quickly became a hit. Sheen eventually had a weekly listening audience of 4 million people, and in 1946 Time described him as “golden-voiced” and “Catholicism’s famed proselytizer.”

In 1951, Sheen moved on to television, then a brand-new medium. Sheen’s telegenic presence and smart, precise presentations drew up to 30 million viewers a week to his syndicated show, “Life Is Worth Living,” a remarkable number that bested Milton Berle.

Sheen was not as fortunate in his church career, however. He was made an auxiliary bishop in New York in 1951, serving under the powerful Cardinal Francis Spellman.

But the two had a falling-out in the late 1950s over Spellman’s claims on millions of dollars Sheen was collecting for charity. In a sign of Sheen’s prominence, Pope Pius XII sided with Sheen over Spellman, but the New York cardinal — who could not abide a rival — reportedly vowed to get even. He pressured Sheen to leave television and effectively exiled Sheen by naming him bishop of the Rochester diocese in upstate New York in 1966.

Three years later, with Spellman dead, Sheen resigned the Rochester post to focus on media evangelization. But his health began to suffer and he died in 1979 and was buried in St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

Now, even in death, Sheen may not be free of his battles with bishops.