Opus Dei spent 70 years converting right wing leaders in D.C. to extreme Catholicism, a lie so faithless that Republicans now have to support Donald Trump and Catholics have to support pedophile priests.
While Opus Dei in D.C. told its target Republican parishioners that priests molesting children was not that big a deal, Donald Trump rose to power.
By Kay Ebeling
New Research for book in progress: There IS a connection between people who defend pedophile priests and right wing politics. it's not my imagination. It's Opus Dei, which for 70 years has actively groomed politicians in D.C. with its own OD church and massive amounts of Vatican, and now billionaire, cash. It's the theme of the book I'm writing online which is linked below. Linked also here is article in New York Magazine from September 2024 that got me going this AM, hopefully I won’t run out of steam before I finish writing about this…
Whenever I get harassed about my blog exposing pedopriest crimes*, the person harassing me is also a Trump supporter. And if I make the mistake of showing a new friend my blog about pedophile priests, I get bullied so badly I've had to move three times. change cities. I hope to write about this more, but my conclusion can only be:
Thanks to Opus Dei, American rightwingers side with pedophile priests.
First Opus Dei converted: Robert Bork, columnist Robert Novak, Kansas senator Sam Brownback, Larry Kudlow, Newt Gingrich, Laura Ingraham, Pat Cipollone
Now even "J.D. Vance, is a convert to conservative Catholicism by way of Opus Dei–" after Father McCloskey moved to Palo Alto in 2005 to continue the Opus Dei mission to recruit rightwinger influencers in the tech part of USA (see last part of this post).
Yes, J.D. Vance too
quotes are from NY Mag article
"The now-infamous Project 2025 was cooked up under the auspices of the Heritage Foundation’s conservative Catholic and Opus Dei–connected president, Kevin Roberts. All three of the Trump-appointed Roe-wrecking Supreme Court justices (two of whom are Catholic) got there thanks in part to the tireless dark-money-funded efforts of the right-wing Catholic Leonard Leo, a major CIC donor who has also become the go-to conservative disburser of anonymously donated big bucks to political causes. The three other justices in the Dobbs majority are hard-right Catholics. Beyond the high court, current and former Washington power lawyers and influencers have Opus Dei connections. The current CIC board chairman, Brian Svoboda, is a partner with the big-shot law firm Perkins Coie. Former board members include Trump-administration attorney general Bill Barr, Trump White House counsel Pat Cipollone, and Kirkland & Ellis partner Thomas Yannucci. Opus Dei affiliates sit on the board of another giant in the right-wing political-donor network, the Bradley Foundation (which is currently pouring money into the rightist stream, including far-right Trumpist groups run by Stephen Miller and Charlie Kirk).
"Hard right Catholics"? Has the world really turned that far upside down?
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more to come as I read through this article:
NYMag article: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/opus-dei-members-catholic-washington-dc-politicans-jd-vance.html
My book "USA sided with pedophile priests, and soon after, the nation fell" still in progress: https://cityofangelslady.blogspot.com/2024/09/prologue.html?zx=a462c8fca0949b6a |
| CIC Opus Dei Church in D.C. |
Imagine you're a numerary at an Opus Dei house in 1990s when first pedophile priest lawsuits were being filed and reported in the news. You moved in as a young priest passionate to resist temptations of the secular world, and here you are in your job responding to news queries at the CIC in Washington D.C. having to come up with an explanation for the growing number of pedophile priest crimes being reported. The Congress members and staff and other Capitol insiders who fill your pews five times a week are asking questions
In the 1990s a young priest numerary is assigned to the News Office for Opus Dei in Washington D.C. He would likely have to respond to breaking news about criminal activity among priests, to questions from influential politicians in his new OD parish;
Someone in that Opus Dei public relations office in D.C. in 1990s had to cook up excuses to defend the pedophile priests- like saying the victims were just after money, or what?
As one of the victims, I want to let Opus Dei know that because they made that leap of no-faith to open a branch in D.C. and influence politicians to become right wing, Opus Dei went SO FAR AWAY from anything resembling Christ’s message or what real Christianity is that-
Me- a little old lady with a laptop, I get bullied
everywhere I go because as one of the victims I wrote a blog about the pedophile
priest crimes.
Because the hatred and evil let loose by Opus Dei connecting Catholics to right wing politics has created a world where Catholics have no choice but to defend pedophile priests and Republicans have no choice but to defend Donald Trump.
And now the hatred overflows and contradicts everything in American culture, giving us MAGA et al.
Same people where I live who are supporting Trump with religious mania think I am the enemy, an old woman trying to get the world to see this horrible crime so many of us lived through. I now see the horrible effects of pedophile priests in the Catholic Church, and-
The Catholic Church's refusal to deal with its pervert priests' crimes, in a humane reconciliatory way, is having devastating effects on the entire world.
Because while Catholic hierarchy were claiming that priests molesting children is not that big a deal, Donald Trump rose to power.
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All these Opus Dei Republicans converted to Catholicism AFTER thousands of priests got away with pedophilia in that church, which to me says a lot.
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More from the New York Mag article:
"Opus Dei has seen its sway rise and fall in the Vatican over the decades, with the more traditionalist popes, including John Paul II and Benedict, more sympathetic. Recently, the more progressive Pope Francis has tried in various ways to rein in the forces of conservativism. But right now, in the U.S. anyway, the organization is on a roll."
"The founder of Opus Dei was a priest, Josemaría Escrivá, now Saint Josemaría, who envisioned a lay brotherhood of men who would engage in the Work of God, a brotherhood that ultimately thrived under Franco’s fascist regime."
"The corporal mortification that The DaVinci Code made much use of is, in fact, real. "
'"wrote Escrivá. “We are an intravenous injection, inserted into the circulatory torrent of society … to immunize the corruption of mankind "'
" The CIC was supposed to be just “a shopwindow for Opus Dei,” Gore writes. But within a decade, it became a hub for converting powerful D.C. players to a version of Catholicism shared by a tiny minority of American Catholics."
"The conservative Catholic convert community in Washington includes some power players in this long game: One is Ginni Thomas, who converted in 2002,...Ginni Thomas has credited the Opus Dei–affiliated Scalias — Maureen Scalia, wife of the late Supreme Court justice Antonin “Nino” Scalia, has been spiritually directed at Opus Dei — for bringing Thomas back to the church. “Both Nino and Maureen [Scalia] really loved and prayed Clarence back to the Church,” Ginni Thomas has said."
"Larry Kudlow, former Trump-administration director of the National Economic Council, converted after recovering from a drug and alcohol addiction."
"Rev. C. John McCloskey, who ran Opus Dei D.C. for decades 'til he died in 2023, appeared on NBC saying that priests accused of sexual misconduct ought to be protected"
HERE IS THE QUOTE FROM a 2002 event where SNAP (pedopriest victims) were handing out flyers in front of a bishops meeting in D.C.)
During press conference abuse survivor Mark Serrano says "This is about regular Catholics protecting their children. It's about victims getting the chance to heal, and it's about church leaders living up to basic moral standards". MS: Panning shot of sexual abuse victims during press conference. GFX: Graphic with supers with header Proposed Reforms and documents, priests could continue to minister while under investigation. INT MS: In interview Catholic Information Center's Father John McCloskey says "You have to protect both the victim who has a right also to keep their privacy if they want, and also the priest that's been accused". https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/video/production-unit-nightly-news-media-type-aired-show-news-footage/1274222700THERE IT IS
In 2002, the priest running Opus Dei in D.C. at a press conference arranged by pedophile priest victims quoted, sticking up for the priests.
OMG there's more:
"a woman McCloskey counseled lodged a complaint with Opus Dei that he had been touching her inappropriately during their sessions... in December 2003, McCloskey abruptly and without public notice disappeared from Washington. In 2005, Opus Dei quietly paid the woman almost a million dollars — a pile of money that came with a nondisclosure agreement. The payoff was not revealed until 14 years later, when the woman approached the Washington Post after reading a glowing article about McCloskey, who was by then ministering in Palo Alto."
McCloskey was by then ministering in Palo Alto
Where Peter Thiel who groomed J.D. Vance lives just 14 miles north in Foster City
More to come shortly
While Opus Dei D.C. told its Republican parishioners that priests molesting children was not that big a deal, Donald Trump rose to power.
So Fr. McCloskey left D.C. Opus Dei after a woman he groped during counseling sessions got a settlement in 2005. He became an Opus Dei priest in Palo Alto, CA, where he likely “ministered” to Peter Thiel and JD Vance. Once a priest is in Opus Dei, he is always in Opus Dei, no matter where he is geographically. Vance converted to Catholicism while under the influence of Peter Thiel and Opus Dei. Probably in Palo Alto...
All these Opus Dei Republicans converted to Catholicism AFTER thousands of priests got away with pedophilia in that church, which to me says a lot.
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"Vance has written that he was initially moved to consider Catholicism after listening to a Peter Thiel talk about the miseries of the self-centered yuppie meritocracy."
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MORE QUOTES FROM NY MAGAZINE INTELLIGENCER
"The telegenic Opus Dei priest is gone, but the converted politicians and influencers and their potent and well-financed allies have grown increasingly powerful in the decades since his work in the capital. And his style of anti-democratic warrior religiosity is now the norm in MAGA politics."
"October 2022, three months after the Dobbs decision, the CIC hosted a $25,000-a-table dinner at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington to bestow its highest honor, the John Paul II New Evangelization Award, to right-wing fundraiser and Opus Dei benefactor Leonard Leo. Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas has called him “the No. 3 most powerful person in the world.” But his role in overturning 50 years of settled law affecting the private lives of hundreds of millions of Americans had perhaps catapulted him even higher in the eyes of the assembled ideologues. Clad in a tux, his face shiny with perspiration so that he kept pushing his round glasses up his nose, Leo singled out the ..." (I highly recommend you pay a dollar to go through the paywall and read this entire article.)
"As it turns out, the Supreme Court released its Dobbs decision on June 24, which also was the date of the Feast of the Sacred Heart in the Catholic calendar that year."
"Neil and Ann Corkery (married longtime D.C. operatives and former Opus Dei members), Tim Busch (who has publicly and approvingly referred to the U.S. Supreme Court as “the Leo Court”), and anti-gay crusader Sean Fieler are a few of the Opus Dei–connected moneybags financing the conservative agenda. Leo-connected networks poured at least $50 million into the organizations behind Project 2025, according to Accountable.US. Project 2025 contains numerous proposals that align with Opus Dei concepts"
"A Washington-area Opus Dei supernumerary named Austin Ruse, president of the fiercely anti-LGBTQ Center for Family and Human Rights, published a book about children"
"Trump’s receptivity to the Opus Dei issues plus the Vatican’s slight move to the left under Francis have together attracted more right-wing Catholic money to the conservative cause and Opus Dei."
JD VANCE
"J.D. Vance’s path to conversion began with Opus Dei–connected priests and other converts, starting with Rod Dreher, a convert himself and “post-liberal” writer staunchly opposed to gay marriage. Dreher has since moved from the U.S. to live in Viktor Orbán’s Hungary, where he works for the Danube Institute, and has converted to Orthodox Christianity. Dreher has approvingly compared Vance to a young Orbán."
*****
Dreher has approvingly compared Vance to a young Viktor Orbán
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'connected Vance with Dominic Legge, a priest and former Justice Department trial attorney who has proclaimed, “A legal system … is ultimately subordinated to the highest common good, which is God himself.” '
"Vance has written that he was initially moved to consider Catholicism by reading Augustine’s City of God after listening to a Peter Thiel talk about the miseries of the self-centered yuppie meritocracy."
"Thiel was also close to the priest who ran the Opus Dei house on the Stanford campus." (Father Arne Panula)
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Posted by Kay Ebeling
Exposing the Catholic Church as defenders of pedophile priests until I die
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EXTRA
Rick Santorum’s journey to devout Catholicism, view of religion in governance (WaPo) In January 2002, prominent Catholics from around the world gathered in Rome to celebrate the Spanish priest who founded one of the church’s most conservative and devout groups, Opus Dei. The event drew cardinals, bishops and other powerful Vatican officials. And among those invited to speak was a future presidential candidate: Rick Santorum, whose faith had become so essential to his politics that on federal documents he listed the trip, paid for by an Opus Dei foundation, as part of his official duties as a U.S. senator from Pennsylvania. In a speech at the gathering, Santorum embraced the ideas of Opus Dei founder Josemaria Escriva, who had urged ordinary Catholics to bring an almost priestly devotion to Catholic principles in every realm of life and work.
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PS Sometimes you have to push the envelope, exaggerate if you will, in order to get a small amount of a hidden crime exposed -ke
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