POPE AND BISHOPS HAVE NO MORAL CREDIBILITY TO CONFRONT TRUMP

Church leaders raked in billions by promoting open borders and illegal immigration

The appointment of anti-border patrol Tucson Bishop Edward Weisenburger to the Archdiocese of Detroit is remarkably similar to the appointment of San Diego Cardinal Robert McElroy to the Archdiocese of Washington. Like Pope Francis himself, both pro-LGBTQ prelates have a history of covering up sexual abuse, and both endorse Francis’ globalist open borders agenda in support of illegal immigration.

When then-Bishop Robert McElroy was installed as the Bishop of San Diego in 2015, one of his first acts was to return Father Jacob Bertrand to ministry after he was reported the previous year for having satanically ritually raped Rachel Mastrogiacomo during the celebration of Mass. Interestingly, during his first press conference following his installation, McElroy announced: “Anyone who is involved in the abuse of a minor, simply, even in one case, cannot be allowed to be in ministry.” It seems his policy did not extend to priests who raped adults as McElroy did not remove Bertrand from ministry until August 2016 after he learned that the priest was being criminally prosecuted. Despite McElroy’s refusal to turn over key files to prosecutors and his failure to meet with the victim, Bertrand was convicted. As was reported in The Wall Street Journal, McElroy hid from the media and had his diocesan spokesman, Kevin Eckery, offer the following disingenuous statement: “We knew that it was poor behavior. We didn’t know that it was criminal behavior.” Bertrand’s removal occurred one month after McElroy covered up the the report he received from the late psychotherapist Richard Sipe documenting how he “interviewed twelve seminarians and priests who attest to propositions, harassment, or sex with McCarrick, who has stated, ‘I do not like to sleep alone’.”

Bishop Edward Weisenburger was ordained in 1987 for the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City. When he served as the Vicar General from 1996-2012, he assisted in evaluations of many allegations into the sexual abuse of children by clergy. However, when he left in 2012 to become the bishop of Salina, Kansas, he had his emails deleted. Some of those records were thought to have had information related to abuse accusations, and their destruction limited the ability of the investigating attorneys to evaluate abuse claims. Even more incriminating is the fact that Weisenburger did not tell an archdiocesan review board what he knew about accused Father James J. Mickus. Unfortunately, Mickus was allowed to return to ministry and had access to children for another fifteen years. He is now on the Archdiocese of Oklahoma’s list of clerics with “substantiated allegations” of abuse.

Two years after Weisenburger was installed as the Bishop of Tucson in November 2017, members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) demonstrated outside of St. Augustine Cathedral where they held signs and childhood photos calling upon law enforcement to probe the way Weisenburger was handling child sex abuse cases in Tucson and in his other assignments. In an effort to discourage abuse victims from coming forward, Weisenburger was reported to have retained a lawyer for an accused priest who filed a defamation lawsuit against a victim which SNAP claimed had the effect of discouraging other victims from coming forward.

In March 2021, SNAP again accused Weisenburger of mishandling claims of abuse. Diana Almader-Douglas who alleged being abused by a Tucson priest, Father Charles Knapp, joined Lauro Garcia and George Brogdon in a RICO lawsuit against the Diocese of Tucson, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, and St. John’s Seminary in California who also employed the alleged predator. Similar to the case involving Father Mickus in Oklahoma City, Knapp’s abuse was covered up and he allegedly went on to prey on other victims in Tucson, Phoenix, Eloy, Safford, Yuma, Nogales, and at St. John’s Seminary in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles after Tucson diocesan officials considered the allegations against him as “unsubstantiated.” Like most of these “slam-dunk” cases involving multiple victims, it appears that the defendants settled out of the court for an undisclosed amount after the plaintiffs signed confidentiality agreements.

The way this case was settled out of court is very similar to how Mark Brooks, a Marine Corps Veteran and former seminarian, brought suit against Father Nicholas Reveles and the Diocese of San Diego. After Brooks reported Reveles for drugging and sodomizing him, he was expelled from the seminary and left destitute and homeless just like Deacon Wieslaw Walawender was unjustly dismissed by Baltimore Cardinal William Keeler after he reported being sexually assaulted by Monsignor Edward Staub. After Reveles left the priesthood to pursue an open gay lifestyle, the Diocese of San Diego settled out of court with Brooks who later reported catching Reveles and San Francisco Archbishop John Quinn watching gay porn together. In 1980, Quinn ordained Robert McElroy a priest for the Archdiocese of San Francisco. McElroy later served as Quinn’s priest-secretary from 1982 to 1985, and later as Quinn's Vicar General. Brooks died prematurely at the age of 56 in 2010, the same year McElroy was ordained an auxiliary bishop at which Quinn served as a co-consecrator. Quinn, whose cause of death was not publicly announced, met his maker in 2017 at the age of 88 with McElroy presiding at his vigil.

McElroy is scheduled to be installed as the Archbishop of Washington on March 11, 2025. Sex abuse victims' advocates believe that he will cover up the sexual predation and homosexual misconduct that was reported to Cardinal Wilton Gregory as early as 14 March 2022 by Washington priest, Father Michael Briese, who wrote, “Three young adult seminarians at the widely respected North American College (NAC) in Rome credibly accused Fr Adam Park of hitting on them for homosexual relations.” Briese also accused Gregory of failing to investigate Father Carter Griffin, the rector of St. John Paul II Seminary, who was accused of sexually harassing former Baltimore seminarian, Karl Discher. It appears that, instead of following protocol in keeping with the Safe Environment Policy for the Protection of Minors and Vulnerable Adults, Gregory suspended Briese for reporting the alleged abuse instead of investigating Park and Griffin who were accused of committing it.

Just as McElroy is being sent to Washington to cover up for Cardinal Gregory who is accused of protecting accused priests like Park and Griffin, Weisenburger is being sent to cover up for Archbishop Allen Vigneron who was sued by a group of Detroit Catholics claiming that Vigneron and the Vicar for Clergy, Monsignor Michael Bugarin, fabricated an allegation of rape against their pastor, Father Eduard Perrone, in order to avoid media criticism about its handling of abuse allegations. Vigneron was also accused of failing to investigate Monsignor Miroslaw Król, the Chancellor of the Orchard Lake Schools, who was accused of abusing subordinates.

After Dublin Archbishop Diarmuid Martin turned over some 80,000 archdiocesan files to the Murphy Commission that revealed decades of abuse and cover-ups by his predecessors, Francis never made him a Cardinal despite the fact that Dublin is the largest archdiocese in Ireland. The appointments of McElroy and Weisenburger illustrate that a requirement for being promoted in the Roman Catholic Church today is to demonstrate one's ability to cover up sex abuse as Pope Francis was documented to have done in Buenos Aires despite having written, “It [sex abuse] never happened in my diocese.”

Given their lack of moral credibility in covering up sex abuse, one might question how McElroy and Weisenburger can speak out against the Trump Administration on behalf of Pope Francis in support of open borders and illegal immigration especially when the U.S. bishops bear responsibility for some 323,000 missing unaccompanied migrant children. The bishops were fully aware of the billions pouring into Catholic Charities from the U.S. State Department, USAID and FEMA. As two investigative reporters noted, “They not only gladly accepted the money, they did nothing to safeguard those they were supposed to shepherd, causing immense harm to millions in the process.” While McElroy and Weisenburger will attempt to mislead their flocks into believing that the Trump Administration is unjust in securing the borders and withholding funds from USAID and NGOs like Catholic Charities, Catholic Relief Services (CRS), and Caritas, informed Catholics are aware of how the U.S. bishops and these organizations have been accessories to the fact of “murder, gang violence, human trafficking, sex trafficking, narcotics trafficking, theft, terrorism, organized crime, torture, rape, assault, kidnapping, corruption, money laundering, various forms of fraud, and environmental crime,” all of which result from illegal immigration.

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Gene Thomas Gomulka is a sexual abuse victims’ advocate, investigative reporter, and screenwriter. A former Navy (O6) Captain/Chaplain, seminary instructor, and diocesan respect life director, Gomulka was ordained a priest for the Altoona-Johnstown diocese and later made a Prelate of Honor (Monsignor) by St. John Paul II. Email him at msgr.investigations@gmail.com.