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[Catholic Caucus] Archbishop Weakland Stole More Than Money, He Stole the FaithSpeak only good things of the dead, the saying goes. The yoga division of The New York Times assumed a veritable Möbius strip of a position to attempt to write a laudable obituary for Rembert Weakland, the disgraced former archbishop of Milwaukee, who died the other day at the age of 95.It wasn’t entirely successful. The eulogist, one Robert D. McFadden, did have to mention that Weakland “paid” $450,000 as hush money to ward off a lawsuit by his former male lover, who accused him of sexual assault. I...

Archbishop Weakland dies at age 95Denver Newsroom, Aug 22, 2022 / 13:50 pmArchbishop Rembert Weakland, a Benedictine who served as archbishop of Milwaukee from 1977 to 2002, died overnight on Monday.Weakland died after a long illness the night of Aug. 21–22 at Clement Manor in Greenfield, a Milwaukee suburb.The archbishop was a progressive who had advocated for the priestly ordination of women. His resignation as Milwaukee’s archbishop came after revelations that the archdiocese had paid $450,000 to silence Paul J. Marcoux, an adult male seminarian with whom he had a sexual relationship.Archbishop Jerome Listecki of Milwaukee commented Aug. 22 that...

In spring 2002, as the scandal over sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests was escalating, the long career of Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland of Milwaukee, one of the church’s most venerable voices for change, went up in flames one May morning. On the ABC program “Good Morning America,” the archbishop watched a man he had fallen in love with 23 years earlier say in an interview that the Milwaukee archdiocese had paid him $450,000 years before to keep quiet about his affair with the archbishop — an affair the man was now calling date rape. The next day, the Vatican...

Dolores Leckey, who worked for the US bishops’ conference for two decades and headed the offices of the laity, marriage and family, youth, women, and lay ministry, has written a review lauding disgraced Milwaukee Archbishop Rembert Weakland’s recent memoir. “[W]hen I heard the radio report on May 23, 2002, that he had had an affair with a man decades earlier, and that in 1998 there had been a cash settlement of $450,000, two thoughts converged,” she recounted: “one, that he fell in love, probably for the first time, and that falling in love has a way of humanizing us; two,...

Letter from Archbishop Jerome Listecki, Milwaukee

"...All readers will be moved by this honest, riveting, and exceedingly well-written story of frustration and hope, sin and redemption..." --Notre Dame's Father Richard P. McBrien, from the book's jacket cover. "As I was leaving [Pope John Paul II] suddenly asked me out of thin air: ‘How old are you now?’ When I replied ‘Seventy-one,’ he did not look me in the eye but, with bowed head and expressionless face gave a low, indistinct grumble. I interpreted it...as a way of saying, ‘I guess I still have to tolerate you for four more years’ --Archbishop Weakland, after his last...

(This is a pastoral letter that was sent to all of Calgary's Catholic parishes). (excerpted) These are not easy times. Priests and people feel battered and scattered by the seemingly relentless media campaign about child sexual abuse in the Church. We, too, have entered into the dark regions of our fallen world. This is a painful, emptying and humbling experience. Pope Benedict XVI, in his Pastoral Letter to Catholics in Ireland, ... addressing the victims of abuse first of all, he acknowledges the grievous betrayal they have suffered and he tells them how sorry he is over what they have...

This Vatican secrecy stuff is ridiculous, archbishops, bishops and priests too, are subject to the civil law, if they break it by concealing evidence of a crime then they should be brought to trial and suffer the consequences of their crime, so enough of this media ranting, lets have some prosecutions. In the case of Lawrence Murphy in Milwalkee, Murphy was investigated by the police, who declined to prosecute. Did Archbishop Rembert Weakland have additional information of Murphy's guilt which he concealed from the civil authorities, which if he had revealed would have brought about his conviction? If so prosecute...

Former Milwaukee Archbishop Rembert Weakland routinely shredded copies of weekly reports about sexual abuse by priests, according to formerly sealed testimony turned over to Milwaukee County's district attorney on Thursday. In a 1993 deposition, Weakland admitted destroying copies of the reports in his office, according to a partial transcript of the deposition released by Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. Peter Isley, SNAP's Midwest director, turned over the partial transcript, as well as portions of the logs to which Weakland was referring, to Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm and asked him to review them for any possible criminal...

Archbishop Rembert Weakland was a distant if familiar villain in my early teenage years. In the vestibule of the parish office where we held our Legion of Mary meetings, our liberal priests would put old copies of the newsletter of the Womens' Ordination Conference, National Catholic Reporter, and other publications of the Catholic left that featured Archbishop Weakland as a hero fighting against the tyranny of the Vatican. He was for dialogue on such issues as the female role in the leadership of the Church, social justice, and the democratization of Church power so that the laity would have...

The following story is by Laurie Goodstein of the New York Times. Be advised that your PP never provides a link to the Times, Nor does he expend any effort to conform to the original source's rules for reproduction of material where the Times is concerned, since they don't deserve that kind of consideration. Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland, the former head of the Milwaukee Archdiocese who has stirred up new controversy with his soon-to-be-released memoir about his decades in church leadership, his homosexual orientation and the scandal that forced his retirement, said on Tuesday that he had decided not to...

NEW YORK (AP) — A Roman Catholic archbishop who resigned in 2002 over a sex and financial scandal involving a man has written a memoir that describes how he struggled with being gay. Archbishop Rembert Weakland, former head of the Milwaukee archdiocese, "is up front about his homosexuality in a church that preferred to ignore gays," Publisher's Weekly wrote in a review Monday. The book, "A Pilgrim in a Pilgrim Church: Memoirs of a Catholic Archbishop," is set to be released in June and is described by the publisher as a self-examination by Weakland of his "psychological, spiritual and sexual...

Bought the latest Milwaukee Magazine for the "Catholics in Crisis" cover story. Among those interviewed for the story were Bishop Richard Sklba and Father Javier Bustos. The article recounts how Bishop Sklba chaired a Catholic Biblical Association of America task force that produced a 1979 report suggesting there is "no historical reason not to ordain women." If that's not enough, here's more historical revisionism via the article's interview with Fr. Bustos, who came here in 1995. "But by the time the report was published, John Paul II had become pope and the church was moving in a different direction. Sklba,...

A Wanderer reader caught in a parish closing/consolidation project, begun during the misrule of the disgraced Archbishop Rembert Weakland, OSB, informs FTM: "In May, we forwarded Archbishop Dolan a booklet (along with supporting documentation) outlining the problems associated with the merger of St. Patrick's of Erin and St. Kilian's of Hartford. At the root of the merger problems, as spelled out explicitly in our documentation, was the difference between the worship styles of the two parishes - St. Patrick's Church being traditional and following the guidelines of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments and the new guidelines spelled...

LOOKING FORWARD:An archbishop examines himself & church structuresCOMMONWEAL/August 15, 2003 "From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required" (Luke 12: 48). That admonition weighs heavily upon me. My personal failings are now public knowledge. I have apologized to the local church of Milwaukee and to the larger church for my transgressions, and I have begged forgiveness. The thousands of letters, e-mails, and phone calls I have received since stepping down as archbishop of Milwaukee convince me that the church's faithful in the United States remain incredibly strong in their understanding of human frailty, sinfulness, and the...

ST. FRANCIS, Wis. (CNS) -- After writing more than 1,000 messages to his flock through columns in the local Catholic newspaper during his almost quarter-century as Milwaukee's archbishop, it's no wonder that now-retired Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland continues to communicate with Catholics. Archbishop Weakland, who resides and maintains an office at the archdiocese's Cousins Center, began a personal Web site in early January. The Web site, www.archbishopweakland.com, features personal reflections, commentary on current events, cultural comments, including thoughts on books, music and movies, and audio recordings of past Sunday homilies given by Archbishop Weakland. A couple months into the project,...

Cruxnews.com Note: Each week we will be bringing you a "New Oxford Note" straight from the venerable New Oxford Review. This week's originally appeared in the November 2003 issue. After less than a year-and-a-half, Archbishop Rembert Weakland is pontificating again. Yes, really! As we all know, it was revealed in May 2002 that Weakland had a homosexual affair with Paul Marcoux, a Marquette theology student and possible seminarian, and Weakland paid Marcoux $450,000 from Milwaukee Archdiocesan funds to cover it up. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported (June 2, 2002) that Peter Isely, who was molested by a priest in the...

Meeting here could lead to priest 'union' Organizers have met with key founder of Chicago association By TOM HEINEN and MARY ZAHNtheinen@journalsentinel.com Last Updated: Aug. 21, 2003 Concerned about the priest shortage and other issues, 14 Milwaukee-area Catholic priests have invited their fellow priests to a meeting that could result in the creation of what essentially is a union. Organizers of New Priest Initiative Richard Aiken, pastor, St. Alphonsus Church, Greendale.Joseph Aufdermauer, associate pastor, St. Matthias Church, Milwaukee.William Burkert, pastor, St. Roman Church, Milwaukee.David Cooper, pastor, St. Matthias Church, Milwaukee.James Dammeir, pastor, Prince of Peace Church, Milwaukee.Steven Dunn, associate pastor,...

The Archdiocese of Milwaukee paid nearly $6.3 million over the years in handling cases of sexual abuse of minors by priests, but more than $2.8 million of that was paid by insurance companies, according to a financial report that was mailed this week to every Catholic household in the 10-county archdiocese. The report, part of a promise by Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan to provide more financial accountability to a Catholic population rocked by nationwide sex scandals, provided combined financial statements on the archdiocese's wide-ranging activities and cash flows for the fiscal year that ended last June 30. Such audited annual...

E. Michael Jones, the major domo of Culture Wars magazine, has written another thought-provoking article following the fall of Rembert Weakland, OSB, ex-Archbishop of Milwaukee. In this article, published in the July/August 2002 issue, Jones brilliantly combines what APPEAR to be two different topics and challenges both the 'conventional wisdom' about the origin of priest-pedophilia cases, as well as the current malaise of the Liturgy. Jones demonstrates that these are not only related, but literally inseparably bound by the personalities involved. Jones begins with the Weakland story--the suddenly accepted resignation after the revelation that Weakland had had a passionate affair...