From our ever growing "clergy in Birmingham who won't be exiled to several different continents" file...

How sad the Jesuits in Birmingham are hosting A Call To Action in Manressa House this weekend.

Manressa House is the home of the novitiate for the Provinces of Britain, Ireland, the Netherlands and North Belgium. Presumably this event is taking place with the agreement of the Provincial and the "Formators" at Manressa House.

How far they are from that unserving loyalty to the Church for which St Edmund Campion died.

St Ignatius must be weeping.

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Interesting that the three Oratorians who an official spokesman described as "entireley guiltless of any wrong doing whatsoever" are still in Canada, South Africa and... actually I have no idea where Fr Dermot Fenlon is.

Meanwhile men who run Manressa house are able to host "A Call To Action" (whose speakers have been known to say that "women’s ordination should be on the agenda") and then sleep soundly at night knowing there will be no knock on the door from Gareth Jones.

Would it be too much of a "conspiracy theory" to suggest that the orthodoxy of the former could be what got them in trouble, while the heterodoxy of the latter is what keeps them safe?

From our ever growing list of priests who won't be sent to "spend time in prayer for an indefinite period" with no notice and then made to live on the other side of the world...

Roger Thomas Danforth and Richard James Termine were married Friday evening in New York. The Rev. David C. Parsons, a Lutheran minister, officiated aboard the Lexington, a chartered yacht, on the East River, with the Rev. Michael DeVito, a Roman Catholic priest and a cousin of Mr. Termine, assisting.

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Because what happened in Birmingham was perfectly normal and priests who are "entirely guiltless of any wrong-doing whatsoever" are vanished away all the time.

Over two years ago now, in the run up to the Papal Visit, three priests of the Birmingham Oratory were suddenly removed from their home and moved to three different continents. Despite their years of hard work towards the beatification of their founder, Blessed John Henry Newman, they were able to watch the once in a lifetime events unfold only on TV.

Their crime? According to journalist Ruth Dudley Edwards, the Oratory spokesman declared them "entirely guiltless of any wrong-doing whatsoever".

The crime, of course, was to take their pro-life message outside the walls of the Oratory where they were too effective for their own good. They publicly embarassed high profile public figures including Tony Blair, they helped stop a visit by pro-abortion MP Clare Short to a Catholic school, they blocked funding from Bill Gates and the Terrence Higgins Trust. Funding that would have come with strings attached.

They were removed because they were getting in the way of the pandoctrinal project to turn the Catholic Church in England and Wales (and most of Europe) in to the new establishment Church where a congregation full of people with status is far too important to let a bit of truth get in the way.

Were they removed from their home through a straight forward, open, canonical procedure? No. They were told that if they did not leave then they would be made to endure a lengthy, arduous, canonical process overseen by the very people who were trying to bully them out. The procedure was the punishment.

Rather than face the lengthy ordeal of clearing their names (and because they have a heroic sense of sacrificial obedience even in the face of abuse) the three complied. It was the only way Brother Lewis Berry was ever likely to be ordained.

I have no idea which higher up prelates were directly involved, but I can tell you in no uncertain terms that if you are a priest or religious and you meet a Fr Gareth Jones, you should start looking for a good Canon lawyer.

So why am I dredging this up again?

Well, partly because I want the executioners to know that there are those of us who have noticed what they are up to. I have no authority to police those who abuse canon law but I can scream bloody blue murder about it. Bullies tend to hide in the shadows and there's no harm in making it clear that the sudden dissapearance of priests is not going to unnoticed.

But also because I can't help noticing that many of the people who scoff at the above as a ludicrous conspiracy theory seem very happy to engage in a bit of conspiracy theorising of their own...

To take just one instance, Archbishop Vigano was tasked with cleaning up certain financial aspects of the Vatican's operations. He was more thorough than he was meant to be, made enemies in the process, and got moved to be the Apostolic Nuncio in Washington. If you want to understand Vatican politics, bear in mind that this post - to what would in most countries be considered a high honour - was in fact a demotion.

It will take some time to get those working in the Vatican to realise that they have to adopt generally accepted standards of transparency in financial affairs. In the meantime, there will be backstabbing, counter allegations, attempts to smear people, and a gradual and painful recognition that some things do actually have to change.

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That an Archbishop was unjustly exiled to Washington for taking too thorough an interest in the financial affairs of unspecified "enemies" is a perfectly acceptable conspiracy theory.

Everybody knows there is backstabbing in the Vatican right?

That three men "entirely guiltless of any wrong-doing whatsoever" should find themselves similarly exiled for to thorough an interest in the pro-life activities of prominent politicians is not an acceptable conspiracy theory.

Everybody knows there is no backstabbing in the Vatican.

From L’Osservatore Romano via CatholicCulture.org

“The holy Father Philip would direct with paternal inspiration the spirit and will of each one of his sons, in accordance with the temperament of each, considering himself satisfied to see them fired by piety and fervent in the love of Christ,” the constitutions state. “Only gradually and with gentle tact did he continue to test and to ascertain as a manifestation of the Lord's will what, by daily experience, was congenial and useful to them, day after day, in the achievement of holiness. And he would say persuasively that this kind of life really was especially suited to secular priests and lay people, and was in conformity with the divine will.”

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Gradually and with gentle tact...

Perhaps they are referring to the famous incident when St Philip turned up in the middle of the night with no warning and sent people away indefinitely for being entirely guiltless of any wrong-doing whatsoever.

I don't know how many of you are new to events at the Birmingham Oratory in the run up to the Papal visit but it's been a while and it might help if I run through it all again.

It was back in May 2010 that The Tablet first carried the news that three Oratorians had been told to “spend time in prayer for an indefinite period by Fr Felix Selden, an apostolic visitor to the Oratory Congregation”. If the Tablet had stopped there that might have been the end of it - such things are an internal matter and helps nobody to speculate on blogs.

Except in this case it wasn't an internal matter, it ceased to be an internal matter when the spokesman for the Birmingham Oratory picked up the phone to The Tablet and named names. However much he might bleat now about privacy, it was the Birmingham Oratory spokesman and not a blogger who made it a matter of pubic record that Fr Philip Cleevely, Fr Dermot Fenlon and Brother Lewis Berry had been “ordered to go on retreat” by Fr Felix Selden. This is the ecclesiastical equivalent of announcing that somebody has been permanently suspended from work - a very public stain on the reputation of these three men and one against which they were entirely unable to defend themselves.

As the weeks turned in to months some suggested that whatever the three had done to deserve their exile, it must have been pretty serious. Rumours of bullying and possible sexual misconduct began to surface. Friends of the three men were so distressed at the way in which their reputations were being “trashed” that they began to campaign publicly that the three were known to be good holy men a blog was started and an open letter was sent to Fr Felix Selden.

To suggest that these friends and wellwishers were guilty of gossip is outrageous. It was gossip and rumour that they were seeking to dispel.

It was about this time that BBC West Midlands became interested and Oratory spokesman Jack Valero was quick to play things down... “it's just a time away to cool down” he said “they can come back soon and we can continue as normal”. Only a few weeks later Jack had changed his tune telling Radio Ulster that the three “are going to come back at some point, we don't know, it's not going to be soon”. This is the sort of transparency most people would associate with a brick wall.

To their credit, the Oratory did defend the three men and Ruth Dudley Edwards reported that Jack Valero had “confirmed unequivocally that the Three are entirely guiltless of any wrong-doing whatsoever”. Of course, this only begs the question – if they have done nothing wrong, why are they away? Why can they not come back? This soon became the central mystery of the Birmingham Three. Three men, declared innocent by an official spokesman for the Birmingham Oratory yet exiled from their home for months and looking increasingly likely to miss the beatification of their founder. Why had they been sent away in the first place?

More questions began to be asked, like why is the press officer for Opus Dei speaking for the Birmingham Oratory? Things didn't get any less mysterious when it turned out that while Mr Valero is officially speaking for the Oratory he is actually being paid to do so by the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales and reports to Archbishop Nichol's press secretary. Yet more questions were raised about the role of the mysterious Fr Gareth/Sebastian Jones...

Pressure was mounting, blog entries about The Birmingham Three were getting hits from Rome, I had been on the Radio and Ruth Dudley Edwards was writing in Standpoint magazine and had even got the story on TV. The same questions were repeatedly asked: If the three have done nothing wrong, why can't they come home?

Something had to be done and something was, I can't say exactly how much pressure Brother Lewis Berry was under when he agreed to spend next year at an Oratory in South Africa but it's very hard imagine he did so of his own free will. The youngest of the three had the most to lose and with his ordination hanging in the balance the press release in his name had all the credibility of a forced confession. Fr Philip Cleevely issued a remarkably similar press release about how happy he is to be spending the next year in Toronto. It would not be long until the men who Jack Valero said would be “back soon” announced plans to remain abroad permanently.

Which leaves Fr Dermot Fenlon, the last of the three. There has been no press release from Fr Fenlon, no statement that he is happy about being sent away from his home of twenty years at a days notice despite being 68 years of age. So Fr Fenlon has been well and truly stamped on. According to a report in the Catholic Herald Fr Fenlon is being “forcibly exclaustrated” for a period of five years. In the article Simon Caldwell writes that “Under the Code of Canon Law, a priest cannot be exclaustrated for more than three years unless there is a “grave reason” yet Fr Fenlon has officially done nothing wrong. Such a prolonged period must have “either the direct approval of either the Holy See or the local bishop, who, in the case of Fr Fenlon, is Archbishop Bernard Longley of Birmingham”.

And so the questions remain: If there has been no injustice, why not let the three speak to journalists and tell everbody how happy they are with the situation? If the three have done nothing wrong, why couldn't they be present for the beatification?

More than a year later - why is Fr Dermot Fenlon still in exile?

Today marks 365 days of exile for Brother Lewis Berry, Fr Philip Cleevely and Fr Dermot Fenlon.

I wonder, is it "soon" yet?

The Church is divided between those who believe in compromise with the world, cosying up to the establishment and being respectable... and those who believe fidelity to the truth is worth being unpopular.

The Birmingham Three were removed because their presence was making it impossible for lukewarm celebrity Catholics so snuggle up to the Beatification for a bit of publicity. Just like the Vaughan School is being attacked because it's admission policy makes it impossible for rich people in Kensington to get a place.

These things are all about silencing the faithful and accomodating those with power, influence and "prestige". Grubby poor people with too many children are not going to be financing the next multi-million eco-friendly offices of the ministry of social justice voices...

My suggestion to bloggers, families in Birmingham and Vaughan parents? Get united. Start supporting each other and let the exile of the Birmingham Three be the moment hundreds of faithful Catholics rose up to stand in their place.

Our Lady of Fatima, Pray for us.

I'm sure this is old news to most of you but some of us really have been living a field for the last two weeks and are just catching up.

According to the Catholic Herald Fr Dermont Fenlon the oldest of the Birmingham Three has been "forcibly exclaustrated" for at least five years because, well, there is no "because"...

Under the Code of Canon Law, a priest cannot be exclaustrated for more than three years unless there is a “grave reason”. A prolonged period must also have either the direct approval of either the Holy See or the local bishop, who, in the case of Fr Fenlon, is Archbishop Bernard Longley of Birmingham.

Yet no Church figure has publicly given any reason why Fr Fenlon has been subject to such severe canonical penalties in the first place.

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Read John Smeaton's excellent coverage of this including his list of questions for the Newman Cause spokesman Jack "the Church is not against condoms" Valero.

Jack Valero's recent radio appearance opposite Ruth Dudley Edwards has allowed me to extend my little video...

"They can come back soon", "It's not going to be soon"

Nice one.

Must... keep... Brother... Lewis... Away... From... Pope...

Meanwhile, it would seem that while the Oratory are busy sending Fr Lewis away for very ordinary training at the other end of the world (a tradition begun by Newman?) the Archdiocese of Birmingham think he is already ordained!

Today is the one hundredth day of exile for The Birmingham Three.

One hundred days is not a short period of time. In one hundred days you could walk from Edinburgh to London and you would only need to cover four miles a day.

To get 100 days in prison you have to do something fairly serious. There was the priest who got 100 days in prison for stealing thousands of dollars from his Church. There was the man who got 100 days in prison for ignoring a stop sign on his motorbike and killing a man. Then there was the man who attacked his girlfriend who also got 100 days in prison.

The Birmingham Three - Fr Dermot Fenlon, Fr Philip Cleevely and Brother Lewis Berry - have done nothing wrong. This is official. Jack Valeo told me on Radio West Midlands that "there's no indication they've done something wrong, they've been punished or anything. these words are wrong they give the wrong impression". Ruth Dudley Edwards says that Jack "has confirmed unequivocally that the Three are entirely guiltless of any wrong-doing whatsoever, including, specifically, sexual misdemeanours or homophobia.

So why have they been exiled for 100 days?

Why has one of them been sent away for a year?

Why are rumours flying around all over the place that the other two will get an even worse sentence?

Today the story hits The Daily Telegraph and we learn a little more about the location of Frs Fenlon and Cleevely: "The Oratory has refused to explain why the three priests have been sent away – one is now in America, another in Canada and the third is going to South Africa"

If these three men have done nothing wrong then the obvious thing is to send them home, end the media speculation and lift the shadow from the Papal visit.