Author Topic: +Vigano on the Persecution of some Texas Carmelites (Read 1320 times)

SeanJohnson · « **on:** June 28, 2023, 02:42:32 PM »

On the Persecution of Some Texas Carmelite Nuns

June 24, 2023

https://remnantnewspaper.com/web/index.php/articles/item/6693-on-the-scandalous-persecution-of-the-nuns-of-the-carmel-of-the-holy-trinity-in-arlington-texas

Blessed are you when they insult you, persecute you
and, lying, they will say all sorts of evil against you because of me.
Rejoice and be glad, for great is your reward in heaven.
For this is how they persecuted the prophets before you. - Mt 5:11-12

Introduction
If there is one thing that causes indignation in the attack of the modernist Hierarchy against the most venerable and sacred institutions of the Catholic Church, it is to see how apparently different situations are managed on the basis of the same script and, significantly, in perfect coherence with a pseudotheological and pseudomoral approach that contradicts the immutable Magisterium of the Catholic Church. The problem with this Hierarchy is that it is at the same time both the official authority and the fifth column of the enemy, so that it acts by the means that ecclesiastical power permits it to use, but for the opposite purpose to that for which the Lord has instituted it. The deep church plays in the Church the subversive role that the deep state plays in civil governments. This situation of institutional dissociation on the one hand makes possible the usurpation of authority by a corrupt and corrupting power, and on the other makes it impossible and useless to turn to that same authority to demand justice; especially when the most aberrant violations are committed with the explicit endorsement of the supreme authority.

I have carefully examined the situation of Holy Trinity Carmel in Arlington, Texas. This Carmel sui juris – that is, placed directly under the jurisdiction of the Apostolic See and not of the authority of the Ordinary – has been made the object of an action worthy of the worst anticlerical and Masonic regimes rather than of Successors of the Apostles. But before addressing the aspects concerning the Carmelite nuns of Arlington, I would like to reflect on the Bishop of the Diocese of Fort Worth, where the Carmel is located.

Who is Bishop Michael F. Olson?
Bishop Olson is well known to the clergy and faithful for his authoritarian and despotic ways: in short, a Bergoglio in miniature. The Catholic community of Fort Worth feels toward him what the Code of Canon Law of 1917, in the case of parish priests who are disliked by the faithful, icastically called odium plebis, an institution that the New Code abolished. A petition has been started with which the faithful of the Diocese are asking the Holy See to remove Olson and send an Apostolic Visitation, attaching a long list of serious behaviors and abuses (here). Needless to say, the Vatican has not given any response to the protests of the faithful, nor has it considered it appropriate to investigate the disputed facts, considering it more urgent to submit to Apostolic Visitation one of the very few American Catholic prelates, Bishop Joseph Strickland of the Diocese of Tyler in Texas (here), thanks to the control that Card. Cupich (McCarrick’s protégé) exercises over the Congregation of Bishops.

Bishop Olson has been known for his aversion to Tradition, ever since, in 2014, he forbade celebrations in the ancient rite at the College of Saints John Fisher & Thomas More (here), a private university that has almost 1500 students from conservative families who enroll their children in this university precisely because it ensures a traditional Catholic formation and the celebration of the ancient Mass. Olson not only violated the provisions of Summorum Pontificuм but also threatened that, if he was disobeyed, he would order the removal of the Blessed Sacrament from the university chapel. Obviously, if Fisher & More College had celebrated LGBTQ Masses or encouraged its students to gender transition, it would have gotten a different response from the Bishop of Fort Worth. Similar limitations, in recent years, have also been imposed on the Carmel of Arlington, especially after Traditionis Custodes canceled the liturgical rights recognized by Benedict XVI.

Bishop Olson does not even hide his visceral antipathy for the Pro-Life movements, which he hinders in their activity and which he has often tried to oust from parish communities, and in particular the Texas Right to Life movement. Instead, he authorized the election rally of a Democratic pro-abortion candidate in the space of another parish and did not fail to publicly support the Democratic Party (here and here). Olson also theorized the evaluation of a person’s quality of life as a sufficient reason to suspend his treatments and let him die (here), contradicting the Magisterium and the Natural Law.

Bishop Olson, a creature of Cardinal Kevin J. Farrell – in the hereditary line of McCarrick along with Cardinals Wuerl, Cupich, Gregory and Tobin – and promoted by him to the Diocese of Fort Worth, shows himself to be in perfect harmony with the doctrinal, moral, disciplinary and liturgical errors of the prevailing Bergoglian progressivism: his obedience is not to power, but is rather a courtesan libido serviendi. The tyrannical nature of this Bishop prone to obscenity – and by what the faithful report, even to blasphemy – has already shown itself in 2018, when the parish priest of San Martin de Porres in Prosper, Father Richard Kirkham, after useless attempts to fraternally correct a priest who had serious moral problems (here), denounced the confrere to Olson and for this he was subjected to psychiatric treatment at the St. Luke Institute (here). And while the scandalous priest did not suffer any punishment, Father Kirkham was deposed from his role as parish priest, removed from the rectory and suspended a divinis. Following this, the parishioners stopped giving offerings to the Diocese and also asked for the reimbursement of the funds already paid for the construction of the church, the oratory and the Catholic school. In 2019, the Congregation for the Clergy annulled as unlawful and illegitimate the suspension imposed by Olson on Father Kirkham, without ordering his reinstatement.

Strong with the weak and weak with the strong
Let us therefore start from the premise that disciplinary action on the part of the Holy See or the Bishops is mainly directed against individuals and communities who are not willing to deny the Faith or to fail in their religious vows to please the new Bergoglian course. The most gruesome sɛҳuąƖ and financial scandals, the adherence to the most scandalous heresies, the promotion of sin and vice against nature are negligible little things that do not deserve commissioners, apostolic visits, interrogations, or investigations: they are the norm of most of the communities best known and appreciated by the court of Santa Marta, as the recent case of the Jesuit Rupnik demonstrates. But a Kyrie or a maniple are enough to move the terrible Vatican war machine against the priest who does not give Communion in the hand or against the Monastery that asks for the celebration of the ancient rite. And when those responsible for these terrible crimes of lese Council are nuns, those who operate this machine reveal themselves in even more abject terms, because they combine the shame of a Prelate who oppresses a member of the faithful with the cowardice of a man who vents his frustrations on a woman – consecrated to Christ – subject to his authority, true or presumed. On the other hand, why should those who have no qualms about offending the divine Majesty hesitate to persecute people who have neither means, nor physical strength, nor social and political relations to oppose their abuses?

The recent case of the Carmel of the Most Holy Trinity in Arlington in Texas is no exception, a female community that in recent years has discovered the Tridentine Mass and more recently has also expressed its desire to take up the traditional Breviary in place of the conciliar Liturgy of the Hours. This choice of the Carmelites, completely legitimate and collegially approved, presents among other things the undoubted advantage of a wider use of the treasure of Biblical and Patristic sources, allowing the women religious to appreciate the consistency between the texts of the Mass and those of the Divine Office.

Cor orans and Vultum Dei quærere
However, it is necessary to make a premise to frame these events in the broader subversive project of Cor Orans, the Instruction applying the Apostolic Constitution Vultum Dei Quærere with which Bergoglio literally revolutionized and distorted the contemplative life of women and instituted real forms of “re-education” to which the cloistered nuns who would like to remain faithful to the Rule and religious vows are obliged. Cor Orans requires the communities to federate with other convents or monasteries of the same Congregation, officially in order to provide assistance to small entities that are no longer self-sufficient, but de facto with the undeclared intention of “normalizing” the contemplative communities by ousting the government of legitimately elected Superiors and appropriating their goods. And if male monasteries, composed of priests, can somehow escape the blackmail of being deprived of Mass, this does not apply to female monasteries, who depend on the local Ordinary for the administration of the sacraments and can therefore find themselves without liturgical celebrations, with grave spiritual damage to the sisters. The Instruction Cor Orans and the Constitution Vultum Dei Quærere thus constitute the normative basis with which the ecclesiastical authority abuses its power to dismantle what remains of the contemplative life after the already devastating experiences of Vatican II and the disastrous reduction of religious vocations.

The Vatican has therefore created a legislative instrument that allows the Dicastery for Religious Institutes to reset the governance of a monastic community, replacing it with its own emissaries. Obviously, where there are no elements that can in any way justify these interferences, the Dicastery or its emissaries resort to invented accusations, falsification of evidence, and completely illegitimate means of intimidation. Of course, we will never hear Prefect Braz de Aviz or Secretary Rodriguez Carballo admit that their purging action is motivated by hatred of Tradition and the desire to re-educate dissenters by force or psychological pressure. On the contrary, the official reasons always concern moral or economic issues, thrown to the media without any respect for the truth, the confidentiality of the investigations, or the people involved. The case of Arlington is no exception, both for the enormity of the accusations made against the Prioress, and for the heaps of abuses and violations that characterize the entire procedure set in motion by Bishop Olson.

The recurrent elements of this systematic persecution of contemplative communities are evident precisely in the arrogant repetition of the same scheme: intimidation, blackmail, generic and unsubstantiated accusation, the spread of fake news, recourse to artificial testimonies, the endorsement of abuses by the Roman Dicastery, and the cooperation of Ordinaries and Federations of Religious Orders.

At the same time, it will be noted that the targeted monastic realities often have properties of conspicuous real estate value, such as to arouse the aims of unscrupulous ecclesiastics interested in appropriating them for profit or to obtain a promotion in exchange. The persecution of the good and the tolerance – if not the obvious encouragement – of the bad are the hallmark of this “pontificate,” which combines the despotic traits of an absolute monarch with the Jesuitic deception of a “synodal” reform of the Church, whose Hierarchy declares itself ready to “put itself in an attitude of listening” and to “question itself.” “How can we create spaces where those who feel hurt by the Church and unwelcome by the community can feel recognized, welcomed, unjudged, and free to ask questions?, asks the Instrumentum laboris (B 1.2, question 6). We discover that synodal inclusiveness applies to sodomites, concubinaries, and polygamists, but not to Catholics and even less to traditional priests and religious, the only category that deserves Bergoglio’s insults and the most ruthless intolerance. I wonder: before including the unrepentant who by their conduct publicly violate the Commandments of God, why do these characters rage against the few Catholics who remain faithful? Is it because these prelates are made from the same pasta as the public sinners who flatter by adulterating Faith and Morals?

The story of the Carmel of the Most Holy Trinity
We come to the story of the Carmelites of Arlington, which begins on 24 April of this year with a phone call from Bishop Olson, in which he announced to the Prioress, Mother Teresa Agnes of Jesus Crucified, that he would visit in half an hour to confer with her and with her assistant, Sister Francis Therese, on a matter of the utmost gravity.

As I have just recalled, the Carmel of the Most Holy Trinity, founded in 1958, is sui juris, that is, subject to the direct jurisdiction of the Holy See, and as such exempt from any control of the Carmelite Order and of the diocesan Ordinary. From a legal point of view, the property and its appurtenances are fully owned by the Carmel, of which the Mother Prioress is the legal representative pro tempore, the only one who can authorize strangers to access the Carmel. It should also be remembered that the Prioress – 43 years of age, of which she has spent 25 as a Carmelite – is suffering from a serious illness that forces her to feed herself with a gastric tube, and that this disabling and painful pathology, in addition to keeping Mother Teresa Agnes often confined to a wheelchair, requires periodic hospitalizations in a day hospital and the use of medications to alleviate its many symptoms and complications.

The Bishop then arrived at Carmel with his Chancellor, Msgr. E. James Hart, and Sandra Schrader-Farry, the Director of the “Safe Environment” Program, the office of the Curia “dedicated to ensuring a culture of safe and respectful conduct in all the ministries of the Catholic Diocese of Fort Worth, improving and protecting the dignity and trust of all the people of God.” A fourth person also appeared, who gave neither name nor qualification, who was later learned to be a forensic technician. The Bishop then read his Decrees, dated 24 April 2023.

The first was the Decree initiating the investigations (corresponding to a notice of guarantee), which contained the accusation against the Mother Prioress of having violated her Vow of Chastity by transgressing the VI Commandment with an adult man, with reference to canon 695 § 1 of the Code of Canon Law. This decree also designated the person charged with the investigation, Sandra Schrader-Farry, and the notary, in the person of the Chancellor Msgr. E. James Hart. The first Decree stated that the investigations were to be conducted with due confidentiality, taking care not to damage anyone’s reputation, including the reputation of the one accused.

The second was the Decree with which Bishop Olson, on the basis of the first Decree, ordered the dismissal of Mother Teresa Agnes, formulating a series of orders and prohibitions that are disproportionate to say the least with respect to the precautions to be adopted in the case of an investigation aimed at verifying the veracity of the accusations made in the first Decree: confinement in the Carmel guest house, sitting in choir without sitting in the prioress’s chair, being forbidden to speak to the novices, being forbidden from making phone calls or using the computer without the permission of the sub-prioress, with the obligation of being supervised; being forbidden to speak with the alleged accomplice of the delict; the obligation to hand over her cell phone, iPad, and computer for forensic analysis. In addition there were two canonical warnings: not to interfere with the administrator of the Monastery who replaced the Prioress, and not to engage in any activity that could constitute a lack of prudence or be a cause of scandal for the faithful. The Decree concludes with the warning of sanctions in the case of its violation and the indication of the possibility of recourse (canons 1734–1739 C.I.C.). This second Decree was substantially promulgated, in the intention of the Bishop, to make the execution of any attempt to defend herself impossible – even simply conferring with a lawyer or meeting with a canonist – because such action would fall within the provisions of the second canonical warning, given that the Decree gave the power of evaluation to the Bishop himself in completely arbitrary terms. “The leave will be re-evaluated, renewed, revised, or revoked ad nutum episcopi,” that is, at the discretion of the Bishop.

In reality, from what is emerging from the statements of the Mother Prioress’s lawyer, Matthew Bobo, it is known that she absolutely did not violate her Vow of Chastity and that the alleged confession of the Mother Prioress was extorted from her by Olson with threats and intimidation, who only at that point supplemented the initial accusation with the aggravating circuмstance that the accomplice would have been, according to his statements, a priest of another Diocese. But if the accusation was really so serious as to justify the exclaustration of the religious, why did Olson use so much caution in protecting the alleged accomplice, even more guilty since he is a priest and as such also deserving dismissal from the clerical state?

This disconcerting accusation was then followed by the two interrogations of the Prioress and Sister Francis Therese, conducted in a completely irrational way and without a canonical advocate to assist them. On the contrary, what leaves us dumbfounded is the recusal of a canon lawyer appointed by the Prioress, citing laughable pretexts, and the simultaneous appointment by Olson of another canonist, Michael Podhajsky, as her ex officio advocate.

Olson ordered the Prioress to remain confined to her cell in the infirmary, forbidden to communicate with her sisters or use the telephone. To this end, the fourth person who came with the Bishop violated the papal cloister and seized all electronic devices (telephones, iPads, computers) without any warrant (nor is it clear that ecclesiastical jurisdiction confers the right to confiscate technological instruments without violating the constitutional rights of the one being investigated). The nuns describe the raid on Carmel and the interrogations of the Bishop as “terrifying,” confirming that the psychological pressures exerted on them have literally greatly upset them. The insults, threats, and intimidating pressures on the Prioress, who had a few days earlier an unsuccessful surgery for which she had been given general anesthesia and which was to be repeated the day after this initial interrogation, were perceived as a real torture. The sisters’ lawyer, in this regard, confirms that her state of physical and psychological prostration induced by the recent operation, together with Olson’s pressures and threats, may well have led Mother Teresa Agnes to admit anything in order to end that torture, as anyone in her place would have done (here).

The next day, 25 April, Bishop Olson returned to Carmel to question other sisters, revealing to them the accusations made against the Prioress and sowing panic in the community. Sister Joseph Marie, the Subprioress, opposed the Bishop with a respectful refusal, specifying that the Nuns would answer questions only after receiving a written indication of the purpose of the investigation. At this point Olson, in outbursts, threatened to expel the nuns from Carmel if they did not obey his orders, announcing that the investigations were considered concluded, that the Monastery would be suppressed and the celebration of Mass was to be considered suspended. In fact, from 27 April to 7 June the daily Mass was canceled, with the sole exception of Sundays, but obviously with the Novus Ordo. The celebrant designated by the Bishop was even accompanied by a guard, as if he was risking his own safety. He was also forbidden to speak with the nuns, to enter the sacristy, or to give a homily. We can well imagine the state of mind of Mother Teresa Agnes and her sisters, deprived of the Mass and the Sacraments as if under canonical interdict.

From the direct testimony of Sister Francis Therese, I learned that the Bishop declared that he was aware of messages that the Superior sent her from a new mobile phone: how could he know about them, without having interception systems? And who authorized these interceptions, since the Ordinary has no authority over Carmel? In what capacity were the Mother Prioress’s phone, iPad and computer seized?

On 15 May, Bishop Olson sent a communication to all diocesan clergy with which he disseminated the slanderous accusations against Mother Teresa Agnes, without providing any evidence, and forbidding any priest to celebrate Mass in Carmel and to visit or communicate in any way with the Carmelites.

On 16 May, a statement was published on the website of the Diocese (above) in which the accusations against the Mother Prioress were repeated and then, on May 31^st, her exclaustration from Carmel was declared, even before the conclusion of the entire canonical procedure. On 11 June, Bishop Olson publishes on the same site a video of similar content (below). This repeated defamatory operation – made accessible to all, after the publication on the internet and the media hype aroused by the news – was conducted maliciously and in the most shameful violation of procedural guarantees. Mother Teresa Agnes was heard only once, on 24 April, in a situation of extreme physical weakness and pain, without any possibility of defending herself, without allowing her to use a lawyer and without drawing up a report of the interrogation and giving a copy to the Prioress, together with the transcript of the audio recording, resulting in cruelly inflicting on Mother Teresa Agnes and Sister Francis Therese. And what gives scandal most of all is his absolute unscrupulousness in exposing the Prioress of a Carmel, a nun, a seriously ill woman, to the media pillory, destroying her reputation without even conducting a fair trial that impartially verifies the validity of the accusations and the reliability of the witnesses. What the media calls “internal sources at the Monastery” do not testify about the accusations made by Olson, but they claim that Mother Teresa Agnes uses marijuana and that she even traveled to Colorado to get some, while admitting at the same time that they have never personally seen her take the drugs. In a video of the local television station WFAA (above), three of these witnesses, despite having been rendered unrecognizable and with their voices modified, seem to be persons with previous reasons for holding a grudge against Carmel and thus completely unreliable. Despite this, the Fort Worth Curia encouraged them to make statements to the local news station.

Meanwhile, the Bishop sowed terror among the sisters, threatening them with exclaustration if they did not obey all his orders, including the one given to the Subprioress, Sister Joseph Marie, to keep written records of all calls, visits by the doctor, and other activities of the Mother Prioress and her assistant Sister Francis Therese, bound in this to ask her explicit permission for everything. An absurd and impractical request for the normal life of a monastic community.

The Civil Lawsuit
Given the repeated violations of every most basic norm of justice, truth, and her health conditions, the Prioress initiated a civil lawsuit against Bishop Olson for the unauthorized raid on Carmel (below) and for the defamation she was subjected to, while she is preparing to make an appeal against the Decree of the Vatican Dicastery for Religious through a canon lawyer.

The first hearing, scheduled for 23 June, was stayed because of the Diocese’s request to present further evidence and to claim the jurisdiction of the Ecclesiastical Forum. But this pretext – which evokes the specter of clericalism so abhorred in words by Bergoglio – is contradicted by the fact that Olson himself abused his power by proceeding arbitrarily against the Mother Prioress even before the Dicastery for Religious decided – in a manner totally prejudicial against the nun involved – to appoint him as Commissary; and that with this abuse he violated the civil laws of Texas and the constitutional rights of Mother Teresa Agnes and of the Carmel, which the ecclesiastical authority is bound to respect.

The Decree of the Dicastery for The Institutes of Consecrated Life and the Societies of Apostolic Life
On 31 May 2023, that is, only slightly more than a month after the first raid into the Carmel, which took place on the 24 April, the Decree was issued by the Dicastery for Religious appointing Bishop Michael F. Olson as Pontifical Commissary (here), with an anomalous protocol number dating to 2020 (2566/2020) and with the erroneous mention of the name of the Monastery of Saint Joseph of the Discalced Carmelite Sisters of Arlington: and therefore it is to this non-existent Monastery that Bishop Olson has been appointed as Commissary. As can be seen, the same drafting errors made in the case of the Benedictine Sisters of Pienza are repeated, made by the same Dicastery and the same conspirators: first of all, the Secretary, Bishop José Rodríguez Carballo, who when speaking on 21 November 2018 to cloistered sisters at a Vatican conference on Cor Orans, exhorted them with rare and sacrilegious impudence to behave “as adults, and not as adulteresses” (here), adding advice that he evidently did not realize would be applicable to himself and his principals:

Do not let yourselves by manipulated! You are the ones who ought to manage your lives, as adult women! It takes not one grill but three to divide you from those persons who want to manipulate you, even if they are bishops, cardinals, friars, or other people. You are the ones who must practice discernment, because there are people who are doing much evil to you. Because they are projecting the ideas they have onto you.

It ought to be emphasized that the Decree was issued on 31 May, when the case of the Carmel of Arlingon had already been made public, and in the absence of previous appointments that would have legitimized the abuses of Bishop Olson – even if only by following a merely chronological formality. The Holy See has practically sanated ex post facto the situation that Olson had created by an abuse of power, and at the same time has designated as papal representative in an action of inspective association the one who ought to judge, in the role of Commissary, his own actions as Bishop which are interfering gravely in the jurisdiction of a Monastery sui juris.

In this case too, just as in that of the Benedictines of Pienza, the Vatican docuмent mentions a generic “particular situation of the Monastery,” without explicitly stating the reasons that led to the promulgation of the Decree and the decision to appoint a Commissary.

I note that the Decree of the Pontifical Commissary (here) is dated 1 June 2023, that is, the day after the appointment of the Commissary. The time that elapsed between the appointment, the investigation, the taking of testimony from witnesses, the interrogation of the suspect, and the editing of the final report and the decree of exclaustration ought to make it clear that the outcome of the trial had already been decided in advance and the gallows had already been set up even before fraudulently interrogating Mother Teresa Agnes with threats, moreover without granting her either her right to make a defense or to have an impartial judge. Is this what Carballo is referring to in the Decree he signed, when it speaks of the “administrative and legal acts already carried out by the Bishop himself,” which the Dicastery intends to sanate ex post facto?

The first Olson’s Decree of April 24, 2023 initiating the investigations (corresponding to a notice of guarantee), mentions canon 695 of the Code of Canon Law, which provides for the dismissal from the clerical state for clerics found guilty of certain delicts, including sins against the Sixth Commandment of the Decalogue committed by clerics publicly or with force. But Mother Teresa Agnes is not a cleric but a religious sister. I wonder then: why did the Holy See want to ratify the “administrative and legal acts” of a diocesan Bishop, which Bergoglio himself redefined with his Motu Proprio Competentias Quasdam Decernere of 11 February 2022, excluding the Ordinary from talking part in a canonical process against a nun of a sui iuris Monastery?

Canon 695 § 2 states: In these cases, after the proofs regarding the facts and imputability have been collected, the major superior is to make known the accusation and proofs to the member to be dismissed, giving the member the opportunity for self-defense. All the acts, signed by the major superior and a notary, together with the responses of the member, put in writing and signed by that member, are to be transmitted to the supreme moderator. As the nuns’ lawyer rightly noted, Olson did not provide either the charges or the evidence, nor did he give the Prioress the faculty to defend herself, nor did he draw up a report and have her sign it.

On the contrary, he imposed a series of restrictive measures and prohibitions which would seem to constitute more the anticipated punishment of the alleged crimes than a means of prudent protection of the investigations. Indeed, it would seem that with those prohibitions Olson almost wanted to avoid having to produce proof of the defamatory accusations, proceeding with the exclaustration of Mother Teresa Agnes due to her disobedience to those prohibitions, and not because of her actual guilt. The habit of using these cowardly and dishonest means to achieve one's goals is demonstrated by the Mephistophelean skill with which Olson has measured out threats, intimidation, psychological pressure and blackmail in blatant violation of the Law and the duty of truth and justice. Yet another example is also the blatant violation by the Bishop of the duties of confidentiality, immediately after having communicated to the Mother Prioress in the first Decree that the investigations were to scrupulously avoid damaging her reputation, sounds like an assertion of arrogant impunity, which finds confirmation in the indecorous sanation of the Decree of the Dicastery for Religious.

With what unscrupulousness was Carballo able to appoint as Commissary the same person who, after abusing his power against Father Richard Kirkham in 2018 and having been repudiated by the Congregation for the Clergy in 2019; after removing and suspending numerous pastors and priests causing so much scandal to the faithful that a petition was circulated to remove him as bishop, he had further compromised himself with canonical violations against the Carmel of the Most Holy Trinity and Mother Teresa Agnes, becoming a party to the case and thereby losing all appearance of impartiality necessary for the exercise of a task as delicate as that of Pontifical Commissary? We have here a plastic representation of the arrogance with which corrupt power flaunts its abuses, even claiming to be able to bend the Law – and Justice! – to its own criminal design.
It goes without saying that the gross errors of the Vatican Decree render it ipso facto null and void. Why, it even concerns a non-existent Saint Joseph Monastery! It is over this phantom Monastery that the Dicastery gives competence to Commissary Olson! In this very sad story there also emerges the complicity between the principals Braz de Aviz and Carballo, and their hired assassins in the Dioceses; along with the evidence of a criminal design carried out following a very precise scheme, with very clear subversive purposes.

The Intervention of the President of the Carmelite Association
As soon as the news was out that Bishop Olson had been inscribed on the list of those being investigated, Mother Marie of the Incarnation, O.C.D., President of the Christ the King Carmelite Association, promptly intervened. In a letter which she addressed to the Prioress using her secular name, Mother Marie tried to induce her and Sister Francis Therese to passively accept the decisions taken by the Bishop and the Holy See and to withdraw the complaint filed with the civil court, in the name of a distorted concept of obedience and resignation to the will of God. I note that this appeal to Holy Obedience applies always and only to clerics, religious, and traditional faithful, while it magically dissolves when it comes to heretics, fornicators, or progressive public sinners. An example of this is the latest Instrumentum Laboris of the Synod on Synodality, which invites everyone to be welcomed, with the exception of Catholics who do not share in the apostasy of the Bergoglian sect. But, as Sacred Scripture teaches, we must obey God rather than men (Acts 5:29), above all when men shield themselves with the authority of God in order to undermine the foundations of the Church which He founded at the price of His Precious Blood.

Two Weights and Two Measures
What then should be expected from a Bishop who is completely within the system, if not the replica of a script that is tried and true? On the other hand, if the staging appears to be exactly the same, we can understand right from the start that in the case of Arlington we are witnessing a new theatrical staging of the same farce by the Braz de Aviz – Rodríguez Carballo duo, but this time with the participation of Olson as the blameless moralizer of the degenerate morals of a sacrilegious Prioress. Who, following the grotesque plot that was hastily and hurriedly put together, according to an earlier statement is alleged to have repeatedly indulged in shameful behavior with a phantom priest of another Diocese, and is supposedly also addicted to the consumption of marijuana. These very serious accusations have been a cause of great sorrow for the sisters and of scandal for the Catholic faithful of Fort Worth, but the health conditions of the sister make it physically impossible for her to have committed any of the crimes of which Olson has had the perverse cowardice to accuse her, obviously without evidence and in violation of any rule of law, either civil or canonical.

The manner in which these salacious accusations have been promulgated, without any respect for the persons involved, is difficult to reconcile with the non-disinterested indulgence reserved for other cases of unprecedented gravity, not the least of which is that of the Jesuit Rupnik, whom the Society of Jesus expelled without any canonical sanction commensurate to the crimes committed. Worse: the Excommunication that had been imposed on him by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for sacrilege and for having absolved in Confession an accomplice in a crime contra Sextum, was removed by direct intervention of Bergoglio. To say nothing of the scandals of McCarrick and his court, all promptly covered up, starting with his trial which, by sovereign decision, passed to the state of res judicata without a hearing, without hearing any witnesses, in total contempt for the victims. And if we want to stay in Fort Worth, the case of Richard Kirkham demonstrates fierceness against an innocent man and, viceversa, the maximum tolerance – and confidentiality – shown towards a priest addicted to alcohol, drugs, pornography, and sex.

It should be borne in mind that the Carmel is located on real estate that is very rich in oil: and thus the true motive for such censorious enthusiasm by Olson or more likely by his principals comes to light. Attorney Bobo has recently declared (here) that the Bishop had previously asked the nuns to send him their benefactors list without success, and that probably the seizure of the cell phone, iPad, and computer by the forensic technician who accompanied Olson on his first foray was aimed precisely at taking possession of this list of donors.

These intimidatory operations have two purposes: on the one hand to feed the desires of those who physically have to take charge of the suppression of a traditional Community and hope to draw personal advantage (the donors list and the real estate) and career recognition; on the other hand to carry forward the work of dismantling female contemplative orders, considered to be a dangerous garrison of Grace that disturbs the nefarious action of the enemies of the Church. Let us not forget that the demon is the first inspirer of the corrupt who infest the public institutions as well as of their counterparts who occupy ecclesiastical institutions: and the demon knows well both how fearsome is the Catholic Mass celebrated by “refractory” priests and how efficacious is the life of prayer and penance of cloistered nuns.

Conclusion
It is not possible to judge the affair of the Arlington Carmel as a fact in itself: it is part of a much broader subversive plan, coherent with the entire ideological plan of the present “pontificate” and more generally with the deviations of the Second Vatican Council, which today have been carried to their extreme consequences. Bishop Olson’s action is affected by precedents that demonstrate his authoritarian nature and his prejudices against Tradition, in addition to his obedience to the line of McCarrick heirs, who are still in office and indeed have been promoted to positions of prestige and power. But the one who manipulates these actions is in Rome, in the Dicastery for Religious, and makes no mystery of the intention to destroy all that remains in the Church, after sixty years of devastation, of contemplative life and of religious life in general. At the same time, the dissolutory work of the Vatican is also moving in the liturgical sphere, with the progressive cancellation of the apostolic Mass and with the “reprogramming” of traditional priests in accord with the dictates of the new ecclesiology. Finally, to ratify apostasy as the purpose of this sect of heretics and fornicators, we may add the Abu Dhabi Declaration and the recent, disturbing declarations of the Instrumentum Laboris fraudulently passed off as the fruit of “grassroots” consultation, while it is nothing other than the sacrilegious product of deviant minds and corrupted souls.

I therefore exhort my brother Bishops, priests, religious, and the faithful not only to prayer and penance to ask for an intervention from Heaven that puts an end to this scandalous betrayal of the Catholic Hierarchy, but also to raise their voices so that the false shepherds and mercenaries are permanently removed from the Church and duly punished for their heinous crimes. And if among the priests who read my appeal there are some who could make themselves available to guarantee spiritual assistance to the Nuns of Arlington and celebrate the Holy Mass for them according to the venerable Tridentine Rite, I think that by this action – which would honor their Priesthood – they could carry out a work of true Mercy that the Lord will not fail to reward. It is time for heroic deeds, for generous souls, for fighting spirits who react against the apostasy that is ever more rampant in the ecclesial body.

I also believe that it is necessary to suspend all contributions to the current ecclesiastical structure, so that those concerned see it as an unequivocal signal of dissent on the part of the lay faithful. May they generously support the traditional communities, especially the Carmel in Arlington and the Benedictines in Pienza, the priests and religious, who are persecuted by the Bergoglian regime!

I make my own the words of Saint Peter in addressing myself to the Nuns: Resist, strong in faith! And know that your fellow believers scattered throughout the world must suffer the same difficulties as you (1 Pt 5:9). Remain united to Christ, your Lord and Spouse, in order to remain united among yourselves in the observance of the holy Carmelite Rule and in the furrow of Tradition.

I invite you all to prayer, that the Lord may give strength, courage, and serenity to the Reverend Mother Teresa Agnes of Jesus Crucified and to her fellow sisters of the Carmel of the Most Holy Trinity, so that the truth of the facts may be brought to light, and along with it the speciousness of the accusations, the malice of those who spread them, and the vile hypocrisy of those who culpably cover up shameful scandals but do not hesitate to attack the Nuns.

May the words that the Roman Pontifical addresses in the rite of consecration of Virgins apply to those who dare to persecute them:

With the authority of Almighty God and his blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, we firmly and under threat of excommunication forbid anyone to distract the present virgins or nuns from the divine service, to which they have subjected themselves under the banner of chastity; let no one takes possession of their goods, but may they possess them in tranquility. But if anyone has the audacity to attempt this, cursed be he at home and away from home, cursed in the city and in the country, cursed when he wakes and when he sleeps, cursed when he eats and when he drinks, cursed when he walks and when he sits; cursed be his flesh and his bones, and from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head let him be without health. May there come upon him the curse of the man which through Moses, in the Law, the Lord has cast upon the sons of iniquity. Let his name be blotted out of the book of the living and not be entered with the righteous. May his part of the inheritance be with Cain the fratricide, with Dathan and Abiron, with Ananias and Sapphira, with Simon the magician and Judas the traitor and with those who said to God: «Depart from us; we do not want the path of your ways." May he go into perdition on the Day of Judgment; may the eternal fire devour him with the devil and his angels, if he has not made restitution and come to amendment. So may it be; so may it be!

Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop and Apostolic Nuncio
June 24, 2023
In Nativitate S. Joannis Baptistæ

SeanJohnson · « **Reply #1 on:** June 28, 2023, 03:11:26 PM »

The problem here is that she admitted the relations (albeit under pressure and coercion, and in a weakened condition), such that now everything is doubtful.

That's the one thing she ought not have done if she was innocent of the charges.

I'm not suggesting she is guilty. Just that a confession is difficult to overlook, and minimally, it muddies the waters.

Ladislaus · « **Reply #2 on:** June 28, 2023, 07:24:26 PM »

Quote from: SeanJohnson on June 28, 2023, 03:11:26 PM

The problem here is that she admitted the relations (albeit under pressure and coercion, and in a weakened condition), such that now everything is doubtful.

That's the one thing she ought not have done if she was innocent of the charges.

I'm not suggesting she is guilty. Just that a confession is difficult to overlook, and minimally, it muddies the waters.

Hard to say, but I've heard of quite a few cases where individuals were badgered into confessing things they didn't do.

Ladislaus · « **Reply #3 on:** June 28, 2023, 07:26:51 PM »

This is the most salient piece of +Vigano's letter:

Quote

I note that this appeal to Holy Obedience applies always and only to clerics, religious, and traditional faithful, while it magically dissolves when it comes to heretics, fornicators, or progressive public sinners. An example of this is the latest Instrumentum Laboris of the Synod on Synodality, which invites everyone to be welcomed, with the exception of Catholics who do not share in the apostasy of the Bergoglian sect.

Similarly, "who am I to judge?" disappears when Jorge rants about the wicked Traditionalists. Religious Liberty and freedom of conscience evaporate where it comes to Traditional Catholicism. Everybody's religion is good and every non-Catholics serves God with heresy and schism ... except the Traditional Catholics.

SeanJohnson · « **Reply #4 on:** June 28, 2023, 07:57:59 PM »

Quote from: Ladislaus on June 28, 2023, 07:24:26 PM

Hard to say, but I've heard of quite a few cases where individuals were badgered into confessing things they didn't do.

No doubt, especially if things look bad for the accused and they stand to spend much more time in jail, and a guilty plea mitigates the sentence.

SeanJohnson · « **Reply #5 on:** June 28, 2023, 09:09:20 PM »

And not Church Militant adds drug use to the list:

https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/insiders-tx-carmelite-nun-hooked-on-drugs

Who to believe??

Thorn · « **Reply #6 on:** June 28, 2023, 09:18:52 PM »

Was this Carmel in Texas started by nuns from the Carmel in Wahpeton, ND?

subpallaeMariae · « **Reply #7 on:** July 01, 2023, 02:01:23 PM »

The court case the sisters filed was dismissed yesterday, after a hearing.
Bishop Olson definitely played a role in the closing of Fisher-More College which was an excellent traditional college, on very valuable property.
The Carmel sits on 70+ acres of prime real estate with an estimated value of over $20 million. It was donated to the sisters in the 70s.
Bishop Olson has had read from the pulpit letters he wrote warning the faithful of 2 different independent traditional priests in the diocese. One of them I knew personally to be a very holy priest, who has since left the area.
Every registered parishioner in the diocese is issued 12 envelopes a year for contributions. If you miss a few months you receive a letter saying a very basic good-bye, you'll be missed.

Ladislaus · « **Reply #8 on:** July 01, 2023, 02:11:19 PM »

Quote from: SeanJohnson on June 28, 2023, 09:09:20 PM

And not Church Militant adds drug use to the list:

https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/insiders-tx-carmelite-nun-hooked-on-drugs

Who to believe??

Everybody has an agenda. I don't trust Olson as far as I can throw him (hint: he's a very large man). Nor do I trust Church Militant and their super secret "inside sources" ... that have been exposed as liars before (if they even existed or had any real knowledge of a particular situation). Is it possible that they occasionally travelled to Colorado to get marijuana (since it's legal there)? Maybe. But they also said some of the sisters had some medical conditions that could benefit from it. As it sinks into the mire and swamp of the lawyers, we'll probably never be able to find the full truth.

subpallaeMariae · « **Reply #9 on:** July 01, 2023, 02:16:20 PM »

Quote from: subpallaeMariae on July 01, 2023, 02:01:23 PM

The court case the sisters filed was dismissed yesterday, after a hearing.
Bishop Olson definitely played a role in the closing of Fisher-More College which was an excellent traditional college, on very valuable property.

I didn't realize the college leased the property, so it is of no consequence, I apologize.

From Wikipedia:
"In June 2013, the college sold its properties adjacent to the TCU campus and moved into leased facilities in the former Our Lady of Victory Academy, a five-story structure built in 1909 and on the National Register of Historic Places.^[6]^[7] After the move, chancellor and board member Taylor Marshall resigned, later saying that the real estate deal had "financially crippled" the college. College president Michael King defended the property sale in a public statement. Marshall also charged that some Traditionalist speakers at college events had publicly denounced the Second Vatican Council and the reformed rite of Mass supported by Popes since 1970.^[8] After a meeting between the college president and newly appointed Fort Worth bishop Michael Olson, the bishop withdrew permission for any celebrations of the Tridentine Mass on the college campus.^[8]

The student population declined: in September 2013, the college had 42 students enrolled, of whom 25 returned for the Spring 2014 term.^[9] A student-aided internet fundraising effort brought in nearly $300,000 to keep college operations going."

Soubirous · « **Reply #10 on:** July 01, 2023, 03:39:59 PM »

A sorry, miserable, and sordid mess in an update from June 28th. The alleged infraction was by phone, and the guilty fellow has terminal brain cancer and isn't currently active as a priest.

Quote

During a hearing in Tarrant County’s 67th District Court, the Fort Worth diocese’s legal team played a tape of more than 30 minutes, in which Mother Teresa Agnes Gerlach could be heard being questioned by Bishop Olson, conceding that while she had an inappropriate sɛҳuąƖ relationship with a priest, and insisting that it was “all over the phone,” and that the priest had not actually visited the Carmelite Monastery of the Most Holy Trinity in Arlington, Texas.

Also in the recording, Gerlach could be heard identifying the priest — Fr. Bernard Marie, whom she said was a member of a religious community with an unusual history — and whom Gerlach said she had met when the priest wrote to the monastery asking for prayers.

But that community said in a statement Wednesday morning that the priest is not actually a member, and is instead a diocesan priest who spent a “few months” as a novice in their Montana monastery.

Two poor creatures who needed discreet intervention and not a public circus as has been pursued by Olson:

Quote

Olson told her that she had “changed the story,” adding, “we have a hard time with the truth.”

Gerlach blamed her health problems, which had reportedly seen her heavily medicated in late 2022 and early 2023, and in the hospital for several medical procedures.

“I promise you, Bishop. At the time, I was having seizures, and I was really in a very difficult position. And I think my brain just got really messed up,” Gerlach insisted.

“And Bishop, I really got very confused,” the nun said on the tape. “I was not in my right mind.”

Further in that article's comment section, for what it's worth, is a note that Olson has been actively lobbying for school voucher expansion, thus the eager interest in that huge parcel of real estate:

Quote

Politician is right. On the political front he has been back and forth to Austin to give testimony in favor of school vouchers since March. I still wonder if the timing of the monastery issues is linked. Just days before, the governor visited Ft. Worth’s main Catholic high school and it looked like one of the voucher bills might pass. But it could just be coincidental.

Oh I doubt it’s a coincidence. After all, why did the Bishop’s right-hand-man suddenly decide out of the blue to tell the Bishop all about his conversations with the Mother from months ago? (Conversations he initially said he assumed the Prioress would handle on her own through the proper channels…) Then the Bishop clears his calendar to personally follow up on the info *the very next day* and (according to his own recording) tells the Mother the fate of the whole monastery is at stake because of her sin. (That’s some impressive sinning! I’m still waiting to have my socks knocked off by the caliber and scope of these sins. Don’t be shy, Bishop, I’m not fragile.)
So... my hypothesis is there was a convo between the Bishop & his head-priest about how he needs land for the new high school he wants to build. A collective lightbulb goes off in their minds, priest remembers he has some dirt that could get the ball rolling, & the rest is history…
Someone prove me wrong. It would make my day.

subpallaeMariae · « **Reply #11 on:** July 01, 2023, 04:03:34 PM »

Soubirous that was my reaction when I read that article yesterday. Two poor, sick religious

blueman · « **Reply #12 on:** July 02, 2023, 04:15:12 PM »

The full interview .

It kind of says it all really.

The nuns have manipulated all of us it seems.

Ladislaus · « **Reply #13 on:** July 02, 2023, 05:08:17 PM »

Quote from: blueman on July 02, 2023, 04:15:12 PM

The full interview .

It kind of says it all really.

The nuns have manipulated all of us it seems.

No, not even close to saying it all.

Author Topic: +Vigano on the Persecution of some Texas Carmelites (Read 1320 times)

SeanJohnson

+Vigano on the Persecution of some Texas Carmelites

SeanJohnson

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Ladislaus

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Ladislaus

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SeanJohnson

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SeanJohnson

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Thorn

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subpallaeMariae

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Ladislaus

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subpallaeMariae

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Soubirous

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subpallaeMariae

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blueman

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Ladislaus

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