By: Elizabeth Schwab www.desertvoice.org May 14, 2006
After the recent announcement of the upcoming departure of the pastor at the Church of St. Agnes, Fr. George Welzbacher, and the transferal of the associate pastor, Fr. Robert Altier, to the position of assistant chaplain at a distant nursing home, Vicar General Fr. Kevin McDonough claimed in comments published by the St. Paul Pioneer Press that these changes should cause no concern and “there is less here than meets the eye.” (http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/14568281.htm)
The fact remains that a priest with a thriving ministry -- who should actually be promoted to the pastorate after an unusually lengthy service of 14 years as associate pastor of this landmark parish -- is being sent to a nursing home where he will have virtually no responsibilities or opportunities to exercise his priestly office. In Fr. Welzbacher’s statement released May 11, his age (he is 78) and declining energy level are named as determining factors in his departure, but states that the “current limited number of priests” in the archdiocese necessitates that he continue to serve as pastor in a neighboring inner-city parish rather than retire. Yet the same archdiocese will move Fr. Altier (at the age of 45) to a vastly diminished position in a nursing home while several parishes in the archdiocese do not have a priest in residence!
Then to add insult
to injury, Archdiocesan spokesman Dennis McGrath told Spirit Daily that Fr.
Altier “was happy with the reassignment and in fact had requested it.” (http://www.spiritdaily.com/altiernursinghome.htm) Fr. Altier never made any such request. The move was initiated by Archbishop
Flynn, and Fr. Altier will obediently comply with his wishes.
It
is suspected that Fr. Altier’s efforts to inform the public on the dangers of the
controversial sex-ed program VIRTUS/TAT (http://www.desertvoice.org/SilencedandExiled.html) are at the root of Archbishop Flynn’s recent actions. With millions
of dollars invested in the VIRTUS program and stockholders’ concerns to worry
about, the archdiocese wants to quiet Fr. Altier as they move forward to
implement this offensive program. Most people do not realize that The National
Catholic Risk Retention Group, Inc (National Catholic) is a risk retention
insurance group that actually owns VIRTUS, and in turn is owned and managed by
shareholders, which include numerous dioceses throughout the United States.
(Check out the financial returns to shareholders in the first section of the
newsletter at http://www.virtus.org/virtus/newsletter.cfm?newsletter_id=38
and see how many dioceses have money invested on page 1, paragraph 1 at http://www.virtus.org/virtus/newsletters/VIRTUS_29.pdf
) In addition, our Vicar General
Fr. Kevin McDonough himself happens to sit on the national steering
committee of VIRTUS. (See page 4 at
http://www.virtusonline.org/virtus/newsletters/VIRTUS_16.pdf) But few people know that an alternative program, Formation in Christian
Chastity (FICC) from the diocese of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, is in full
conformity with Catholic Church teaching and is available to the public free of
charge. (Get it here http://www.primaryeducators.org/)
Many
have wondered why Archbishop Flynn would continue to promote VIRTUS/TAT when he
really prefers FICC (See Fr. Welzbacher’s statement at end of page: http://www.desertvoice.org/responseoffraltierandfrwelzbacher.htm), and the answer may come down to the issues of money and the promotion of the
homosexual agenda.
This would not be surprising if one takes into account the financial
investment already made and considers the rampant homosexual subculture that
DOES exist in the Saint Paul-Minneapolis archdiocese. Before his death from AIDS earlier this year, local
homosexual activist Bill Kummer
“related how he had been able to manipulate Archbishop Harry Flynn into
pushing the homosexual agenda in the archdiocese, and how parents who objected
to [his] agenda were frustrated in their efforts.”
(See The Wanderer article at http://thewandererpress.com/a11-3-2005.htm).
What a tragedy if the
souls of innocent children are being corrupted due to financial interests and
the desire to pacify homosexual lobbyists!
No wonder Fr. Kevin McDonough is quick to tell the public, “There’s less here than meets the eye,” because by the looks of things, one would have to say that there’s probably a whole lot more than meets the eye!