More on St. Boniface and Diocese of Orange

I received this email and felt it should be shared so that prayers may be offered for all involved:

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Dear friends of St. Boniface, the Diocese of Orange and The Holy Roman Catholic Church,

This is the first email to the St. Boniface community.

We will be distributing more information by email, so it would be a great help if you could get others at St. Boniface (and anywhere in the Diocese of Orange) to add themselves to our email list. If you would forward this email to all those you know, and add a personal note of encouragement to be added to the email list, it would be a great help.

Also, if you and/or some of your friends would be willing to help in any way: translating flyers, handing them out before and after the mass you regularly attend, making phone calls, or starting prayer vigils/devotions that would also be invaluable.

Please let us know if you can help and we will contact you asap.

Please join us in a Novena to St. Rita (St. of the impossible) beginning Sunday, May 14, thru Tuesday, May 22 - Feast day of St. Rita, for the conversion of souls of priests and bishops and salvation of Holy Mother Church (and add your own intentions) in the Diocese of Orange. http://ivory.lm.com/~strita/strita.html (scroll down to Novena Prayer). You could also print it out and distribute it to friends on May 14, after Sunday Mass, and/or recite after daily mass at St. Boniface.

Here are a few more links with information about our diocese.

http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/abbott/060420 (this one is VERY long and detailed with lots of documented support and links covering many different subjects)

http://closedcafeteria.blogspot.com/2006/05/bishop-brown-saga-continues.html (This is a new blog posted about St. Boniface. Please add your comments or personal experience on the "comments" link at the end of the post)

http://www.bettnet.com/blog/index.php/weblog/comments/the_sin_of_kneeling/

(This is one of the posts on the above link. These links are very informative, also)

Bishop Brown has publicly opposed laws that seek to prevent homosexuality from gaining special protection and bent over backwards to appear tolerant and accepting of homosexuals, whether in society or the seminary.

In February of 2000, Bishop Brown sent each priest in the diocese two articles by Fr. Gerald D. Coleman dealing with the Prop. 22 ban on homosexual marriage. In the message Bishop Brown wrote that Fr. Coleman’s article “expresses very well my own thoughts on this subject.” In that article, Fr. Coleman argued, “Some homosexual persons have shown that it is possible to enter into long-term, committed and loving relationships, named by certain segments of our society as domestic partnerships.” The story was chronicled in the Los Angeles Lay Catholic Mission:

Damnable Falsehood, Los Angeles Lay Catholic Mission, January 2001,
http://www.losangelesmission.com/ed/articles/2001/0201cc.htm

Studied Ambiguity - Reply to Father Coleman’s Open Letter to the Mission, Los Angeles Lay Catholic Mission, May 2001, http://www.losangelesmission.com/ed/articles/2001/0501cz.htm

Lynch Responds To Coleman, Los Angeles Lay Catholic Mission, June 2001, http://www.losangelesmission.com/ed/news/0601news.htm

A copy of the memo can be seen here: http://closedcafeteria.blogspot.com/2006/04/brown-orange-vol-i_11.html


Bishop Brown has even looked the other way while one of his own priests, Fr. Rod Stephens, was known to be living with his gay lover and allowed him to continue as Director of Liturgy and Evangelization for the diocese.

Fr. Stephens has since taken a leave of absence from the priesthood, but Bishop Brown has allowed his pastors to retain his consultation services throughout the diocese and pay him handsomely, reportedly to the tune of around $300.00 an hour at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish, St. Anthony Mary Claret Parish, and the Mission San Juan Capistrano.

The Fr. Rod Stephens cover-up was documented in the Los Angeles Lay Catholic Mission:

All That Perceptions Stuff - Ex-priest Rod Stephens Still Works in Orange Diocese, Los Angeles Lay Catholic Mission, July/August 2004, http://www.losangelesmission.com/ed/articles/2004/0407rk.htm
Bishop Brown also allowed a gay priest looking at naked boys and gay sex on his computer to remain at a Catholic parish that has a grade school.

See : Diocese breaks zero tolerance vow, Orange County Register, July 20, 2003, http://blogs.ocregister.com/orangepunch/archives/2006/03/diocese_zero_tolerance_for_tra.html

See also: No Vow Of Silence Here, OC Weekly, Dec. 26, 2003 - Jan. 1, 2004, http://www.ocweekly.com/ink/04/16/news-arellano.php

His record on the subject of homosexuality makes it clear that this issue is very dear to his heart.

Does anyone else see a pattern here?

Bishop Brown said he didn’t want to be a part of an initiative that he claims “contributed to attitudes of intolerance and hostility directed at homosexual citizens.”

Yet he has no problem contributing to attitudes of intolerance and hostility directed at Catholics who practice traditional Catholic piety!

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As I suggested, we should pray for all involved in this...