As an ex Benedictine Monk, I bought this book with a bit of deep cynicism and suspicion. Well I was proved wrong, as this book deals primarily with the hypocritical double lives of the prelates and Ecclesiastical members of church militant still alive and deceased. I was expecting a denunciation of the sacraments of the church and an attack on all the good done by the church both past and present . I was pleasantly surprised, intrigued and enlightened .
Although the writer has made one or two mistakes in describing some parts of the Vatican, this is just a grain of sand in the well researched and informative book. I read this book over a serious of days and knowing what I knew then back in the days of my religious some years previous , I now realise that I was so naive and blessedly shielded, from the intrigues , sexual predatory behaviour and hypocrisy that was almost the norm in most religious Orders/Congregations and the wider church in general .
What I get from this book and what I’m going to tell everyone is this : don’t put anyone on a Pedestal as you never know how they will turn out...
One of the main problems that the church has always been plagued wit, is this putting of people dedicated or consecrated to God on high pedestal and a halo put in their head like an invisible crown- when you put people on a pedestal, they begin to think that they are better than everyone else and are not accountable to any temporal authority but God. The by product of this, is a very rigid boys club where members do anything to cover each other’s asses based on their shared knowledge of the sexual or financial misdemeanour, that they are guilty of . This secrecy is at the heart of the sexual abuse scandals plaguing the Americas, Oceania , Africa etc.
There’s no one size fits all for a kind of panacea that would be the solution to adults preying on kids or young adults who they exercise great power over . It’s not given to every one to live chaste lives as priests or religious but what could happen are two people of the same sex or differing sex finding an emotional and psychological fulfilment that is non sexual - that in itself is left for another day and time for discussion.
Although I’m no more a religious, I still deeply love mother church. As I read about the lives of Pope John Paul II and Benedict XV, I realised that what I suspected about these two pontificates were decidedly correct and true. I do not know why Pope John Paul was canonised as a Saint as he didn’t deserve that due to his love of the stage during Papal ceremonies , shielding and protecting senior known Prelates and dignitaries of the Roman Curia from prosecution , who were suspected of or were found guilty of predatory or child sex abuse cases, from their respective jurisdictions all over the world . I do not know but he’s no Saint .
Benedict XV is also a very divisive Pope Emeritus and I doubt that he will ever be beatified or Canonised but what I find particularly harrowing is his hypocrisy concerning the root causes of the clergy abuse and his depiction of gay, lgbt people as “ intrinsically disordered “ . What a Pharisee!! My blood boils when I think about him and the rest of the gay mob over there in the Vatican.
This book also peels away the layers as it were, from the various factions , groups and cabals within the church who jostle for their own selfish self interest. I find it particularly jarring that the dicastery or congregation responsible for the Family are mostly unmarried men who have probably never held someone in their arms or saw the beauty of someone through their eyes. These Prelates and Ecclesiastics of the church have become cold hearted and reptilian. They don’t know what it is, it is , to be vulnerable and intimate . How to deal with , or dealing with intimacy is the elephant in the room .
Fittingly towards the end, the author talks about the life times of his adored Parish priest who he knew growing up and who was so rigid and puritanical. Behind rigidity there’s always a double life and this aptly describes his former parish priest who eventually died of Aids and wasn’t even accorded a church burial due to the stigma of then AIDS pandemic - my heart bled and I shed tears on how this same system of a double life has created monsters and caused deep emotional trauma and scars in the lives of its clergy and religious . The church he served so well , abandoned him in the end and he died alone . A truly riveting and informative book. I recommend this book to all and sundry and especially to all those priests and religious still living double lives bordering on the closet. This life is too short not to be who you truly are meant to be . Embrace it, nurture it and live your own truth.
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Reviews with images
BAD QUALITY, GOOD BOOK
This is the first time i get a book that is sooooo poorly made. As you can see it is not completely glued or it is just out of the press. Maybe it got wet on its way to my house.Regarding the content of the book, I am learning a lot and trying to see past the brokeness of these men. I am reading it in spanish on scribb, but i needed a printed copy as well, that's why i ordered here in amazon. I am in part 1 chapter 5 and pretty much all i have heard in the media is mentioned in these pages. I think is better to be informed than to pretended that is not happening in our churches, to our seminarians, teens and kids.
Top reviews from other countries
Vaccani William
DECISAMENTE PIU' CONVENIENTE
Reviewed in Italy on December 23, 2021
G.G.W. LEWIS
Superbly well researched, a must read...
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 25, 2019Mary Jo Rabe
An excellent, important book
Reviewed in Germany on September 17, 2019cristian vlaicu
La relevante información que hay dentro.
Reviewed in Spain on April 23, 2019