White Catholic Voters Driven by Baseless Fear and Dark Money

White Catholics favor Trump by 59% as shown by a Pew Research poll conducted July 27 – Aug. 2, higher than the 54% of all white voters. (In this poll, Latinos were only 18% of registered voters.)

“Swing states, such as Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Wisconsin have an oversized influence on the outcome of the presidential election. Catholics comprise 20-25 percent of the population in these states,” according to the Political Science Now.

“Targeting this group proved effective for Trump in 2016, when he won the Catholic vote in the swing states of Ohio, Michigan, and Iowa by larger margins than his statewide differential. In Ohio, he won the Catholic vote by 20 points, compared to an 8-point statewide win, while in Michigan Trump won the Catholic vote by 18 points, compared to a one-point state victory,” stated Political Science Now.

Another Vatican Scandal or Just Business as Usual?

“Vatican prosecutors, working with Italian authorities, executed a search and seizure warrant” on July 15. Cell phones and iPads belonging to London financier Raffaele Mincione were seized at a hotel in Rome.

Mincione, former fiancé of Paul McCartney’s ex-wife Heather Mills, had filed two civil lawsuits in the UK’s High Court of Justice against the Vatican on June 20. Both lawsuits are related to a deal brokered by Mincione for the Vatican in 2014 – their purchase of a 45% interest, through his holding company the Athena Global Opportunities Fund, in a London building to be converted into luxury apartments.

That deal “raised questions about the Vatican’s murky finances and poor investment strategies in the past decade and sparked fresh speculation about its Machiavellian turf battles, power struggles and score-settling,” the Associated Press reported.

Opus Dei’s William Barr, the Trump Whisperer

Barr is “a good deal more sophisticated and intelligent” than Trump. “It is Barr who is using Trump‘s relative naivety ‘to advance an agenda that he’s long held,’” Stuart Gerson, former assistant attorney general for the Civil Division of the Department of Justice under Barr, told Andrew Feinberg, White House correspondent for Newsweek.

“Trump’s presidency, gave Barr ‘an opportunity to put himself in a position to assert his own political agenda’ and ‘shape the legal establishment to suit his own political ends,’ posited Jonatha Smit,” one of Barr’s high school classmates at New York’s Horace Mann school.

The Moral Demise of American Catholic Bishops

“You cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24)

After Trump held up a Bible while standing in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church, non-Catholic religious leaders expressed anger and disgust.

Catholic Church Received Federal Covid-19 Funding

The federal small business loan program created in response to the coronavirus pandemic has funded 20 percent of the Catholic entities that applied under the original $349 billion program.

“Statistics compiled by the Diocesan Fiscal Management Conference show that 8,000 parishes, 1,400 elementary schools, 700 high schools, 104 diocesan headquarters, 185 Catholic Charities agencies and 200 other diocesan organizations in 160 dioceses had applied for assistance.”

In Unprecedented Numbers, U.S. Bishops Named in Lawsuits and Why It Matters

(Warning. This report includes graphic language that may trigger bad reactions in those who have been sexually abused.)

Since March 2019, 15 bishops (see below) have been named in lawsuits either as perpetrators of sexual abuse or for covering up the sexual assaults of others. This is important because while “priests were raping boys and girls, the men of God who were responsible for them not only did nothing; they hid it all. For decades, monsignors, auxiliary bishops, bishops, archbishops, cardinals were protected; many were promoted,” stated a 2018 Pennsylvania grand jury report.

Thousands of American priests have been sued but relatively few U.S. bishops have been identified by name in court proceedings. “For true bishop accountability to occur, two things must happen: 1) there must be a full account of the bishops’ responsibility for the sexual abuse crisis and 2) bishops who have caused the abuse of children and vulnerable adults must be held accountable,” leaders of the online database, BishopAccountability.org, concluded.

Vatican Archives: A History Already Known

The Vatican opened its archives on March 2 to preapproved scholars regarding the papacy of Pope Pius XII during World War II. The records have been “kept secret for decades amid accusations that he turned a blind eye to the Holocaust.”

However, we already have an accurate history of Pius XII’s wartime record thanks to decades of research and painstaking work by some scholars. These include Michael Phayer, author of The Catholic Church and the Holocaust, 1930-1965 and Pius XII, the Holocaust, and the Cold War. Phayer thanked other historians for their contributions upon which he depended, including John F. Pollard, author of Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy: Financing the Vatican, 1850-1950.

Pope Francis’ Seven-Year Reign Brought Division in the Vatican and the Rest of His Church

Pope Francis was elected on March 13, 2013. Since then, he has been directly responsible for past, present and future sexual torture and brutalization of children. He has obstructed the battle for women’s and LGBTQ persons’ equal rights and appeased tyrants. The pope has also created intentional and unnecessary acrimony with Vatican employees and within his Church.

Pope Francis’ Seven-Year Reign a Disaster for Too Many

The pope will celebrate the 7^th anniversary of his election on March 13. He is directly responsible for past, present and future sexual torture and brutalization of children. He has obstructed women’s and LGBTQ persons’ human rights and appeased tyrants.

As Supreme Pontiff, Pope Francis “wields the biggest bully pulpit of any spiritual leader on the planet,” noted American political scientist Joseph Nye. The pope should “share the Church’s teachings with the world in order to help shape public discourse and policy in ways that protect the common good and promote the flourishing of all persons.”

From February 17-23, clergy sex abuse survivors and advocates are returning to Rome to mark the one-year anniversary of Pope Francis’ summit on child sex abuse and “demand more action and change” stated the leaders of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

Pope Francis made “a lot of promises to the world that he was going to put an end to this and put safety measures into place to ensure that there was no more – or to prevent future coverups,” said Brenda Brunelle, who was abused from age 12 and founded the southwestern Ontario chapter of SNAP.  “Speaking as a survivor and an advocate for those abused by priests, I’m afraid to say that our report card is a failure.”

Pope Francis Met with Mike Pence – 69,550 Migrant Children Held in U.S. Detention Ignored

On Jan. 22, Pope Francis “urged men and women of goodwill to promote and practice a culture of welcome especially towards vulnerable migrants in search of a better life.” Care of migrants has been a constant theme of his pontificate.

Two days later, during “a remarkably long meeting at the Vatican, especially for one not involving a head of state” the pope and vice president discussed the “sanctity of life” for the unborn, religious persecution in the Middle East and the impoverished in Venezuela.

No mention was made of “an unprecedented 69,550 migrant children held in U.S. government custody in 2019 [alone], enough infants, toddlers, kids and teens to overflow the typical NFL stadium. That’s more children detained away from their parents than any other country, according to United Nations researchers. And it’s happening even though the U.S. government has acknowledged that being held in detention can be traumatic for children, putting them at risk of  long-term physical and emotional damage.”