This is 1000% correct. Its all shell games to them. Broke? Realllllly....sell off so.e of those priceless antiquities you have hanging in churches and other spaces across the globe. They use bankruptcy as protection pure and simple
The Catholic Church has a history of financial corruption going back centuries. In Medieval times they would accuse people of crimes, torture a confession out of them, then confiscate their property. The Vatican Bank was created as a money laundering operation for Mussolini. I do not understand why the Catholic Church still exists. That said, they’re not a whole lot worse than many other religious tribes.
This is a game that the Catholic Church has been playing for a considerable while now. The steps are simple: 1) Get wind of a priest or priests who are about to get either arrested or sued, 2) Transfer all valuable properties and cash out of the immediate hands of the organization, and 3) Claim poverty and a total inability to pay restitution.
If it were possible (and maybe it is), the court should order the reversal of those transfers, then DEMAND that the Christian Brothers PAY WHAT THEY OWE IN FULL.
Because, as with so many other onerous things going on these days, this crap has gone on long enough.
Of course they’re selling off their assets to avoid accountability. It’s good they’re going out of business, as it were, but they need to be held liable for their shady dealings. Seize the buildings and jail the people who thought they could get away with it. Fraud, this is fraud. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the EREA didn’t have skeletons in its closet as well. Check browser histories all around.
I bet EREA sets up another RCC brotherhood or similar organization once this washes over.
That's how the mining industry often works in the US: promise to pay all environmental cleanup after extracting the minerals. Extract, make profit, shift the profit to a parent/daughter/other company, declare bankruptcy, never do the cleanup, parent/daughter/other company uses the shifted profit to start new mining company. Rinse, repeat.
It means the money for cleanup should be put aside before they are allowed to start, or at a minimum the local government should demand some pay as you go setup.
For cases like this one, it means that the moment the judge gets lawsuit coming in, they should freeze all ongoing asset transfers and not allow any new ones without court permission. However I'm not sure that would have helped here, as it sounds like this group was cagey and started the asset transfers years before any court case started. Which supports the notion that the folks at the top knew exactly what their priests were doing for those years.
Indeed. Not just put them under scrutiny, but make them set aside monies for potential future lawsuits and damage penalties. Maybe this means that whatever comes after the Christian Brothers are considered guilty until proven innocent.
Wanna know what gets the clergy's blood up? It's not the broken bodies and minds of children, it's that clergy absconding with church funds. THEN they're tooth and nail in crucifying the high-collared perp.
In choice between god and mammon, god comes in a poor 2nd.
I'm guessing that I 𝘸𝘰𝘯'𝘵 be surprised when I find out which three conservative dingleberries wanted to give Dear Leader the power to unilaterally Amend the Constitution- will I?
*𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘵- Correction: It was Ballscratch who joined Uncle Thomas and Alitosis in fully dissenting. Beerpong 𝘮𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘺 agreed with his bootlicking colleagues that Cheetolini didn't violate the Constitution by violating the Constitution, but sided with the majority for other reasons 𝘯𝘰𝘵 related to setting the 14th Amendment on fire- which, to reiterate, was something he was totally okay with.
The vote was 6-3 but 4 of the justices rejected the constitutional basis. One of the 6 thought Trump's action was illegal but not unconstitutional. This one should have been 9-0. Downright scary that it wasn't.
The corruption and lack of accountability of the RCC and its associated orders is well-documented from Dante on down.look at all the priests and popes he placed in Hell.
Distraction — did you see the movie “in the hand of Dante”? It has Oscar Isaac, Gal Gadot, and Gerard Butler and plenty of others. I thought it was interesting, though a bit graphic at times and my husband thought it was slow, he didn’t like it. I did. Anyway, it was about finding an original manuscript of the divine comedy in modern times. I thought it might be something some folks here might be interested in.
I didn’t. But, I went through a period in my teens and 20s where I was fascinated by Dante and how such a brilliant mind could get taken over by a religion which I found quite unbelievable.
I’m not going to go into details, because my real name is displayed on the article. But I read this morning of an evangelical pastor in Australia whose 24-year-old son was sentenced to a year of prison for raping the 13-year-old girl.
If you could read this article, you would know that for the son, this isn’t his first goat rodeo. The judge gave him a rather lenient sentence, even though the young man admits that he wanted to hurt someone BECAUSE HE WANTED TO FEEL SOMETHING. Can you say psychopathic personality/The lawyer claims it’s because of a porn addiction. Ummm, no. Dad is upset because he was kicked off the local soccerteam— oh the pain. The church elders knew about the young man’s offenses, and did nothing. The list of things that are absolutely wrong with this whole story is longer than my arm.
This won’t be news to anybody, but It seems to me that there are actually two churches. There is the church that for whatever reasons tries to do some good in the world. And then there are the churches that are perfect exemplars of absolute corruption and moral rot. And perhaps there’s a third church: the ones that maybe try to do some good in the world, but still teetering on the edge of absolute corruption and moral rot.
As to the "two churches" thing, sometimes they are so intertwined that one cannot be separated from the other. The archdiocese of Boston comes to mind here, and I'll bet it is by no means alone!
OT: A funny news story about the tiny crowds at State Fair on the DC Mall. It starts 48 seconds in. Someone had the bright idea of zooming in on a guitarist's sunglasses. The reflection in the glasses shows the size of the "crowd".
Thing is, it's a valid question. The RCC has skirted the law, both in their abuse of children AND in their monetary activities, for about as long as they've been in existence. They deserve to be called to task for it, and of course, they don't.
The Catholic Church pleading poverty anywhere in the world is a cruel, sick joke.
They're definitely morally bankrupt, but cash-wise? Pull the other one.
This is 1000% correct. Its all shell games to them. Broke? Realllllly....sell off so.e of those priceless antiquities you have hanging in churches and other spaces across the globe. They use bankruptcy as protection pure and simple
Selling off a few statues in the Vatican Square would cover all of their debts.
Big money, real estate, corruption, financial shenanigans, pedos. Does that remind you of a certain someone?
Too fucking many to count. Yeah, that guy too.
It could be a night time soap opera.
Yes.
The Catholic Church has a history of financial corruption going back centuries. In Medieval times they would accuse people of crimes, torture a confession out of them, then confiscate their property. The Vatican Bank was created as a money laundering operation for Mussolini. I do not understand why the Catholic Church still exists. That said, they’re not a whole lot worse than many other religious tribes.
Well, they're telling us what they really worship: money and power.
Catholic clergy are ill-equipped to fight evil because they ARE that evil.
This is a game that the Catholic Church has been playing for a considerable while now. The steps are simple: 1) Get wind of a priest or priests who are about to get either arrested or sued, 2) Transfer all valuable properties and cash out of the immediate hands of the organization, and 3) Claim poverty and a total inability to pay restitution.
If it were possible (and maybe it is), the court should order the reversal of those transfers, then DEMAND that the Christian Brothers PAY WHAT THEY OWE IN FULL.
Because, as with so many other onerous things going on these days, this crap has gone on long enough.
I know nothing about Australian law, but most legal systems have a mechanism to force reverse of a transaction which only was meant to hide assets.
Of course they’re selling off their assets to avoid accountability. It’s good they’re going out of business, as it were, but they need to be held liable for their shady dealings. Seize the buildings and jail the people who thought they could get away with it. Fraud, this is fraud. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the EREA didn’t have skeletons in its closet as well. Check browser histories all around.
Technically it's more money laundering than fraud, since the victims never acted on the deceit of 'we're broke'. But yeah.
Arrest the head honcho. Who might that be?
I bet EREA sets up another RCC brotherhood or similar organization once this washes over.
That's how the mining industry often works in the US: promise to pay all environmental cleanup after extracting the minerals. Extract, make profit, shift the profit to a parent/daughter/other company, declare bankruptcy, never do the cleanup, parent/daughter/other company uses the shifted profit to start new mining company. Rinse, repeat.
Which means that local law enforcement needs to watch them like a hawk.
It means the money for cleanup should be put aside before they are allowed to start, or at a minimum the local government should demand some pay as you go setup.
For cases like this one, it means that the moment the judge gets lawsuit coming in, they should freeze all ongoing asset transfers and not allow any new ones without court permission. However I'm not sure that would have helped here, as it sounds like this group was cagey and started the asset transfers years before any court case started. Which supports the notion that the folks at the top knew exactly what their priests were doing for those years.
Indeed. Not just put them under scrutiny, but make them set aside monies for potential future lawsuits and damage penalties. Maybe this means that whatever comes after the Christian Brothers are considered guilty until proven innocent.
Maybe they deserve said treatment.
W.R Grace did that to Libby, Montana. Asbestos.
Wanna know what gets the clergy's blood up? It's not the broken bodies and minds of children, it's that clergy absconding with church funds. THEN they're tooth and nail in crucifying the high-collared perp.
In choice between god and mammon, god comes in a poor 2nd.
Which suggests that they know as well as we do that their god is a bunch of hooey.
They need to save some money to pay off the next scandal.
OT - Supreme Court Rejects Trump's attempt to curtail birthright citizenship:
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/supreme-court-nixes-trump-attempt-limit-birthright-citizenship-rcna266935
Jeez! SCOTUS got ANOTHER one right ... but they SCREWED UP on Trans kids in sports! 😝
I'm guessing that I 𝘸𝘰𝘯'𝘵 be surprised when I find out which three conservative dingleberries wanted to give Dear Leader the power to unilaterally Amend the Constitution- will I?
*𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘵- Correction: It was Ballscratch who joined Uncle Thomas and Alitosis in fully dissenting. Beerpong 𝘮𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘺 agreed with his bootlicking colleagues that Cheetolini didn't violate the Constitution by violating the Constitution, but sided with the majority for other reasons 𝘯𝘰𝘵 related to setting the 14th Amendment on fire- which, to reiterate, was something he was totally okay with.
The vote was 6-3 but 4 of the justices rejected the constitutional basis. One of the 6 thought Trump's action was illegal but not unconstitutional. This one should have been 9-0. Downright scary that it wasn't.
Pre-CISE-ly!
Told the trans athletes (who are few and far between) “tough luck” while simultaneously rubber stamping almost every horrid thing Trump wants to do.
And we know Trump will simply ignore SCOTUS on birthright citizenship.
https://youtu.be/u5CVsCnxyXg
No ... none at all.
The corruption and lack of accountability of the RCC and its associated orders is well-documented from Dante on down.look at all the priests and popes he placed in Hell.
Distraction — did you see the movie “in the hand of Dante”? It has Oscar Isaac, Gal Gadot, and Gerard Butler and plenty of others. I thought it was interesting, though a bit graphic at times and my husband thought it was slow, he didn’t like it. I did. Anyway, it was about finding an original manuscript of the divine comedy in modern times. I thought it might be something some folks here might be interested in.
I didn’t. But, I went through a period in my teens and 20s where I was fascinated by Dante and how such a brilliant mind could get taken over by a religion which I found quite unbelievable.
I’m not going to go into details, because my real name is displayed on the article. But I read this morning of an evangelical pastor in Australia whose 24-year-old son was sentenced to a year of prison for raping the 13-year-old girl.
If you could read this article, you would know that for the son, this isn’t his first goat rodeo. The judge gave him a rather lenient sentence, even though the young man admits that he wanted to hurt someone BECAUSE HE WANTED TO FEEL SOMETHING. Can you say psychopathic personality/The lawyer claims it’s because of a porn addiction. Ummm, no. Dad is upset because he was kicked off the local soccerteam— oh the pain. The church elders knew about the young man’s offenses, and did nothing. The list of things that are absolutely wrong with this whole story is longer than my arm.
This won’t be news to anybody, but It seems to me that there are actually two churches. There is the church that for whatever reasons tries to do some good in the world. And then there are the churches that are perfect exemplars of absolute corruption and moral rot. And perhaps there’s a third church: the ones that maybe try to do some good in the world, but still teetering on the edge of absolute corruption and moral rot.
As to the "two churches" thing, sometimes they are so intertwined that one cannot be separated from the other. The archdiocese of Boston comes to mind here, and I'll bet it is by no means alone!
OT: A funny news story about the tiny crowds at State Fair on the DC Mall. It starts 48 seconds in. Someone had the bright idea of zooming in on a guitarist's sunglasses. The reflection in the glasses shows the size of the "crowd".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HygL0onkT8
At what point do we start treating the RCC like the international crime syndicate it is?
I know, I know... I'll have a better chance of spotting winged swine out the window.
Thing is, it's a valid question. The RCC has skirted the law, both in their abuse of children AND in their monetary activities, for about as long as they've been in existence. They deserve to be called to task for it, and of course, they don't.
Because religion.