BishopAccountability.org
	Inside Look at the Legionaries of Christ NECN February 12, 2010 http://www.necn.com/02/11/10/Inside-look-at-the-Legionaries-of-Christ/landing_newengland.html?blockID=179291&feedID=4206 [video presentation] Father Marciel Maciel Degollado founded the Legionaries of Christ in his native Mexico in 1941. “He was an extraordinary man,” says Phil Lawler, editor of Catholic World News. “He obviously had terrific gifts and a terrific charismatic ability to make people follow him. Charismatic and successful, a close friend of Pope John Paul II, he was one of the greatest fundraisers of the modern church. His order swelled to more than 800 priests and 2,600 seminarians in dozens of countries. The movement also has thousands of consecrated men and women, pledged to a life of chastity and poverty, as well as a lay branch of 60,000 dedicated to missionary work. As Fr. Michael Brisson, LC explains it, “our mission is to help people to love Christ. And when they love Christ, to help others to love Christ.” The Legionaries of Christ have a strong presence in New England - a pre-school for boys in New Hampshire and one for girls in Rhode Island. The order's Novitiate and College of Humanities are in Cheshire, Connecticut. All total - 157 schools and centers, a global reach extended under the leadership of Fr. Maciel. “There seems to be in all that I've read and heard a much deeper allegiance to the man than just to what it means to be a Legionary,” says Sr. Maureen Sullivan, OP, of St. Anselm College. But the worldwide order and its lay group are now in turmoil as they learn disturbing truths about their charismatic founder. “Without a doubt, the revelations of our founder were difficult” says Fr. Brisson. “They were surprising, they were scandalous.” In 2009 the Legionaries revealed that Maciel violated his priestly vows by keeping a mistress, fathering a daughter, and allegedly using legion funds to support them both. Five more children have since come forward with paternity claims. Now, there are questions about who in the order knew about the double life and who helped cover it up. “What he was doing,” says Lawler, “apparently from what we've heard, could not have been done without at least the acquiescence of some other people who are presumably still in the leadership of the order.” Last year, the Vatican ordered a thorough review of the Legionaries of Christ and all of its institutions. There is also renewed attention to the details of Fr. Maciel's personal life. As early as the 1950s, he was removed as the legion's leader, and hospitalized for morphine addiction. The Vatican investigated claims of drug abuse and the misuse of funds, but cleared his name and reinstated him a short time later. A 1997 newspaper article laid out multiple accounts of sexual abuse made by nine former seminarians -- some stories were retracted, others were backed up. For years the allegations gained little traction. But as Lawler notes, “the order was getting along famously with the Vatican until Pope Benedict was elected, and things went awry quickly after that.” Shortly before he was elected pope, then-Cardinal Ratzinger looked into those sexual abuse allegations. In 2006, with no explanation, the newly elected pontiff removed Maciel from ministry and offered him a retirement of prayer and penance in Vatican city, where the legion founder died in 2008. For legionaries, the move was the first affirmation that something was wrong - that the rumors they were told to dismiss had some merit. “For me it wasn't clear,” says Fr. Brisson. “It was kind of a mixed message. It's not pronouncing guilt, but at the same time, it was. It was saying, there was a punishment there.” Lawler says despite the legion's admission of Fr. Maciel's transgression, it will be tough for the order to regain credibility. And he suspects the Vatican watched Maciel for years before it decided to act. Sr. Sullivan also believes both the Vatican and the Legion should have been forthright at the earliest allegations of sexual abuse. She says, “the Church has felt the need to protect its own image, to protect itself to protect from scandal. This should have happened, I think, sooner.” The investigation now underway could result in any number of outcomes, from recommendations on how the order can move forward to suppression of the order. “It's an extraordinary crisis,” says Lawler. “I can't think of a precedent in the history of the Church. There may be one but I don't know of it.” Fr. Brisson is one of thousands of ordained and lay members caught between Maciels's broken vows and his own pledge to a life of Christian work, which he made right after high school. “I wasn't checking out,” he recalls. I was just following an invitation. God opened the door and I walked through it. Like most of his fellow Legionaries, he views the Vatican-ordered review as a process of purification and is open to any decision the Vatican makes. “The Church says you need to change this aspect or that aspect, we'll do it. If they were to say we're to be dissolved, we would all go somewhere else.” Some say it's too late to salvage the order. Many want the Legionaries of Christ to disband entirely, given the fact that some of Maciel's closest confidants are still in the order's leadership. “And given his apparently double life,” says Lawler, “you really have to ask that question, not only about him personally, but also about his work.” There have been both ordained and lay members who have left the order, yet 143 seminarians are enrolled in the Connecticut novitiate. 36 were new this fall. “We came here because we realize that God has planned something for us and we, we want to follow that plan,” says Br. Elias Sayegh, a second year seminarian from Venezuela. That plan -- and the vocation of the Legionaries -- will be determined by the Vatican-appointed team of bishops reviewing the Legionaries of Christ. For now, the Holy Father has given the order and the men and women who carry out its work, his blessing. “It's a sign to me that God is with us,” says Fr. Brisson, “and he wants the best for us and he wants us to continue. I am undeterred.”
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.