News Item: : Ah, there's nothing like a fair trial!
(Category: Torch of The Faith News)
Posted by admin
Monday 04 June 2018 - 13:45:44

Something Which Can Be Said

Somewhere in the canon of English literature, I forget where just now, there is a jokey sort of thing about shipwrecked mariners washing up on a desert island, in fear that the natives may be inhospitable, or even worse may turn out to be savage cannibals.

The bedraggled sailors' worries turn to joy when they spot a gibbet and see preparations being made for a public hanging. ''At last,'' shouts their relieved leader, ''a Christian land!''

Although alien to the Bergoglian, though not in fact to the traditional Catholic teaching on the matter, these men were gratified to notice that they were safe in a land which was governed by the principles of the rule of law.

Though hanging was brutal, the primitive conditions rendered it necessary for public safety in extreme cases. This assured those shipwrecked survivors that there would, at least, be no arbitrary killings or indiscriminate barbarism. Everyone would be entitled to a fair trial with an unbiased jury. At least, that was the theory.

As overseas observers have noticed to their astonishment, there are some trials in present day Blighty, the mere description of which by UK residents, certainly in details ordered impermissable by the courts, might rapidly drop a fellow into prison.

A bit like landing on the wrong square in Monopoly; only more swift, secretive and without the sense of fun.

Or even the race car...

That being said, I do think that some overseas observers, in their understandable zeal to stand up against paedophile ''grooming'' gangs of Islamic males - a horrific phenomenon which has blighted contemporary Britain - have missed the nuanced fact that Tommy Robinson's arrest came about because the breaking of reporting restrictions could have been deemed to have prejudiced an ongoing series of trials of such gangs.

Had this happened, as America's National Review acknowledged, ''it would have been an additional blow to victims who deserve justice.''

As you know, that principle of an unbiased jury is essential for a fair trial.

Nevertheless, the National Review also makes the clear point that, on the other hand, Robinson's supporters are angered by the fact that he is being treated with greater suspicion of guilt than the Islamic extremists or the mass rapists he has tried to expose.

Charlie to Chile

Archbishop Charles Scicluna cools off in Malta. Hey, go easy with the Kool Aid there!

I have realized this weekend that, in my haste to type out an article on the recent incident, in which Francis supposedly told Juan Carlos Cruz of Chile that ''God made you gay'', there were two major lacunae.

The first is that, whilst I mentioned the dreadful abuses committed by Fr. Karadima, I also failed to mention the key point that this abuse had been witnessed by Bishop Barros; who Francis subsequently made Bishop of Osorno, thus causing untold scandal and extra hurt to the victims involved in the case.

I've just finished reading two meticulous articles by the international child protection attorney Elizabeth Yore at The Remnant.

These articles have filled in for me certain gaps in my own knowledge and understanding of that ongoing and horrific case. I highly recommend readers read and digest those articles, which are entitled, Anatomy of a Cover Up: An Open Letter to Pope Francis and FrancisGate: What Did the Pope Know and When Did He Know It?

Both of these articles will be well worth your time to read them; especially for you to grasp the chronological timeframe, the characters involved and the behaviour of Francis throughout the whole of this unfolding saga.

A key mystery in all of this for me involves the fact that, had Pope Benedict XVI behaved in the scandalous manner that the evidence against Francis shows that he has, then the world's media, to say nothing of the big governments, would have been baying for him. And yet, although media have turned somewhat against Francis through this story, it has been nothing like it would have been if Benedict had been involved. One only has to look back at the way the media portrayed and harassed Benedict, even though he did much to speak against and to counter clerical sex-abuse, throughout his public years on the Throne of Peter, to grasp the truth of all that.

Anyway, the other lacuna in my article related to my theme that, ''at least Juan Carlos Cruz can now feel that his complaints have been heard by Church authorities who can actually do something.''

Reading this weekend's reports that Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta was heading back to Chile for the next round of the investigations into the whole scandal made me realise that my earlier article had failed to observe that Scicluna was the character to whom Juan Carlos Cruz had had to speak.

Although it remains true that Cruz does feel that Scicluna was helpful and understanding of him, and that he also hopes the archbishop will do something positive to deal with the situation, it remains the case that Scicluna himself is a hugely problematic figure.

As we noted several times in the opening months of 2017, Archbishop Charles Scicluna had issued, together with his neighbour Bishop Mario Grech, sacrilegious ''guidelines'' regarding the implemenation of Amoris Laetitia.

What is more, priests and seminarians under his jurisdiction complained that they felt serious pressure to comply with these so-called ''guidelines''.

Who's on First? No, not Abbott and Costello, but Scicluna and Grech. They want to ''accompany'' folk. Judging by their sacrilegiously heretical guidelines, I'd give it a miss!

At the time, we pointed out that Scicluna's actions went clearly against the warnings of the Council of Trent regarding the excommunication of those who promoted sacrilegious holy communions.

We must rightly ask then: How can a man like Scicluna, one who has consistently and publicly promoted the sacrilegious heresy of communion for adulterers, and added to this enormity by enforcing this among his own clergy, possibly ''clean house'' in Chile?

And when one reads Elizabeth Yore's Remnant articles, one must ask further: Why is the involvement of Francis himself not being scrutinised by Scicluna's commission?

To remedy my lack of mention of Scicluna in the recent article on Chile, here is a satirical little ditty which I first penned and posted up here last year, in defence of the faithful priests who were fearing a Scicluna-led persecution in Malta.

O Good Priests of Malta!

There once was a chap called Scicluna,

whose theology suddenly went lunar!

He held that the Pope, had unlimited scope;

Like declaring that Goldfish was Tuna!

On the road down to Heck,

With his neighbour called Grech,

he issued his good priests a warning:

If Pope Frank says its right,

to set your own hair alight, 

then, by jove, you'll do it by morning!

'Coz Pope Frank can't be wrong,

When he speaks with his tongue,

or shows us by way of instruction:

That short is now long;

and right is now wrong;

whilst goodness is outright corruption!

'Til Pius Thirteen,

arrives on the scene,

he conceded by way of deflection,

Then 'neath Frank's yoke, we shall lean,

like there never has been,

ought else in our Holy Religion!

The priests of those isles,

though they wore their best smiles,

feared they might get suspended.

For Kasperian wiles,

stretching miles of sea miles,

had left all reason upended!

O good priests of Malta,

by God's grace do not falter;

join up in a reverent union.

You must tell that chap Charles,

though he sulks or he snarls:

We'll not give adulterers Communion!

Alright, we've had a laugh. Let's say a sincere ''Hail Mary'' for Charles Scicluna's salvation. 

Many are the Trials of the Just Man 

I noticed at the weekend that Judge Sir James Munby, President of the Family Division of the High Court, had been here in Liverpool to give a speech at the University.

During that speech, just weeks after the tragedy of the Alfie Evans case in this same city, the judge suggested that the collapse of the traditional family in the UK should be welcomed and applauded.

Yes, really!

He claimed that this was so, because of the prevalence of single parent households, artificial donor insemination, surrogacy arrangements and same-sex ''marriages''.

It doesn't look, so far, as though there has been any kind of rebuke, or defence of the traditional family, from Liverpool's Archbishop Malcolm McMahon.

Once again, it is not hard to spot the Orwellian ironies of a judge holding such a job title, and thus having such influential responsibilities and duties, saying such radical things. 

At least the judge is due to retire soon. And it is encouraging to see that some politicians, such as the former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith, did challenge his remarks in the aftermath of the university speech.

The Case of ''Speckled Jim''

As a Catholic trying to call people to a new life in Christ, I would not nowadays recommend for people to watch the British television comedy show, Blackadder Goes Forth. No, some of the humour is a bit on the ''blue'' side for me to even think of doing that.

Still, the show was a feature of my own misspent youth and there was some interesting socal critique in the comedy.

I was chuckling this weekend at the remembrance of one particular scene in which Captain Edmund Blackadder is being court-martialed, having been accused of the crime of shooting and eating General Hogmanay Melchett's beloved carrier pidgeon, ''Speckled Jim''.

Blackadder Goes Forth: Rowan Atkinson, Hugh Laurie and Sir Tony Robinson as, respectively: Captain Edmund Blackadder, Lt. The Honourable George Colthurst St. Barleigh and Private S. Baldrick. I'm not sure who played ''Speckled Jim'' the carrier pidgeon!

As the court scene opens, it becomes clear that the moustachioed General Melchett, the purported victim in the case, is sitting in the courtroom as judge; and later on is even called forward as a key witness for the prosecution!

There is a hilarious exchange between the characters, which goes like this:-

Edmund: Who is the judge by the way?

Melchett: (Boldly) Me!

Edmund: I'm dead!

Melchett: Well, come on then , come on! Get this over in five minutes, and then we can have a spot of lunch. The court is now in session, General Sir Anthony Hogmanay Melchett in the chair. The case before us is that of the Crown versus Captain Edmund Blackadder, (Aggresively toward the direction of Blackadder in the court room), the Flanders pidgeon murderer! Oh, uh, hand me the black cap, I'll be needing that!

Edmund: (With cynical resignation) I love a fair trial...

Ah yes, we Brits certainly love nothing more than a fair trial. But, hang it all, in the shipwreck of post-modernity, we begin to realize that we don't have a monopoly on them... 

---

This news item is from Torch of The Faith
( http://www.torchofthefaith.com/news.php?extend.1705 )