Belling does a public service and highlights this article, written by the PROSECUTING JUDGE (Fr. Brundage) in the Fr. Murphy brouhaha.
...We proceeded to start a trial against Father Murphy. I was the presiding judge in this matter and informed Father Murphy that criminal charges were going to be levied against him with regard to child sexual abuse and solicitation in the confessional.
...In the summer of 1998, I ordered Father Murphy to be present at a deposition at the chancery in Milwaukee. I received, soon after, a letter from his doctor that he was in frail health and could travel not more than 20 miles (Boulder Junction to Milwaukee would be about 276 miles). A week later, Father Murphy died of natural causes in a location about 100 miles from his home
The "newspaper of record" did NOT contact Fr. Brundage about this story. The "newspaper of record" also didn't bother with the truth.
...Almost all of my quotes are from a document that can be found online with the correspondence between the Holy See and the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. In an October 31, 1997 handwritten document,
...The problem with these statements attributed to me is that they were handwritten. The documents were not written by me and do not resemble my handwriting. The syntax is similar to what I might have said but I have no idea who wrote these statements, yet I am credited as stating them.
Perhaps a slimeball attorney slipped those into the pile?
...in the documentation in a letter from Archbishop Weakland to then-secretary of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith Archbishop Tarcisio Bertone on August 19, 1998, Archbishop Weakland stated that he had instructed me to abate the proceedings against Father Murphy. Father Murphy, however, died two days later and the fact is that on the day that Father Murphy died, he was still the defendant in a church criminal trial.
Well, isn't THAT interesting? Abp Weakland was the one who wanted to 'call it off.'
Abp. Weakland. My, my, my.
Yes, interesting that he says that Ab. Weakland "stated that he had instructed me to abate the proceedings" in his (Weakland's Letter) to the CDF. He goes on to say that if this were the case he would have insisted on escalating it to the Holy See. ("Had I been asked to abate this trial, I most certainly would have insisted that an appeal be made to the supreme court of the Church...")
ReplyDeleteSo, did Weakland really tell him to halt proceedings or was that just what he said to the CDF?
As I read it, the implication is that while Weakland may have wanted the proceeding quashed, he hadn't yet told Fr. Brundage this when he wrote to the CDF.
So did Weakland lie in his letter to the CDF...?
Hard to imagine...[sarcasm]
If Murphy was that close to death, I can see why Weakland wanted to end the proceedings.
ReplyDeleteCheck out the most recent Newsweek story on Rat-Zinger, titled "The Bad Shepherd." Is every news source lying?
ReplyDelete