Given Caritas’ worldwide presence, international profile and that it acts in the name of the church, the Vatican “has the task of following its activity and exercising vigilance in order that both its humanitarian and charitable action and the content of the documents that it disseminates may be in harmony with the Apostolic See and with the church’s magisterium, and in order that it may be administered with competence and transparency,” the monsignor wrote. Read the rest of this entry »

“These are not cuts to the ambitious projects of a group of Montreal-based development experts.”

Sure it is, Gino.  It’s about perspective.

It’s all about downsizing and living within one’s means and getting back to the basic principles of the Mission of the Church which is not what D&P has been engaging in the last 40 years.   Your funding will never be restored again.  In fact, it’s downhill from here on in…as your donations continue to decline, as your membership ages and exits from this world.  You’ve got no new blood, Gino.

Social justice (as has been defined these past 40 years) is finished, Gino.  There’s no going back.

…about D&P.

If any CBC reporter wants to talk to me about any potential puff piece on D&P, you can forget it.

Don’t bother calling or e-mailing me. You’ll get no response from me because we all know what kind of journalistic balance and quality the CBC puts out.

The day the CBC is cut off from public funding will be  a day of great celebration in my house.

The Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) recently issued a statement saying they are “extremely disappointed” with the news that the Canadain Catholic Organization for Development and Peace had its latest government funding come in much lower than expected.

I for one couldn’t be happier. (Source)

And I’m thrilled that Brian is writing for The Catholic Register.

…Fifty top astronauts, scientists and engineers at NASA have signed a letter asking the agency to cease its global warming buffoonery. The global warming emperor has no clothes, and people are finally saying so out loud and in public…(Source)

Good to know the Canadian Catholic Church’s official development and aid arm is not political or involved in social avante guard causes.

Well, the Leviathan dies hard.  Check out this puff piece by Michael Swan.

The article is hardly surprising, but the comments are notable.

I have no doubt that the average Catholic in the pew will give more to D&P this Lent, simply because the bishops told them to do so.

The Good News is that Catholics generally don’t give much money at Mass. I know.  I’m an usher. I see what people put in the basket.

Let’s pray and hope that, in this case, Catholics stay tight with their money.

The reality for us who have been waging this campaign against Development & Peace is that there will not be a quick fix here.  It will only come when these rebellious bishops are replaced with obedient ones.

Here’s an observation I’d like to share with my readers… Read the rest of this entry »

So, it’s been over three years now since the Development & Peace scandal broke.  If you missed it, you can catch my round-up here.  I’d like to say that I’m satisfied with the progress made thus far, but the hard realityis that the progress we’ve made has been either incidental or minor. 

Now it’s true that Development & Peace has suffered a huge setback with CIDA’s recent funding cut, and it’s true the Catholic blogosphere and LifeSite News might have had a small part to play in that.  And it’s also true that we’ve had a grudging admission of the problem.  I say “grudging” because, as Archbishop Richard Smith said, the problems are with a few groups.   (A few groups?  Over four dozen is a “few”, your Grace?).  We’ve also had more bureaucracy setup by the CCCB to handle the those pesky “inquiries” which Catholics may have about Development & Peace’s perpetual pro-abort partners. Read the rest of this entry »

Here we go….again. 

The Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association is a rabidly liberal group.  We all know this.  There’s plenty of evidence, going back decades.

Therefore, it will not come as any surprise that some of its charitable endeavours like this campaign called Help Lesotho which is supposed to be helping orphans, vulnerable children and grandmothers is actually doing some other things….like sponsoring Young Women’s Gender Conferences.

And what do they learn at these Conferences?

The impact of the conference was clear in the girls’ eagerness to learn more. During the conference evaluation, girls indicated that they learned how to protect themselves against teenage pregnancy and [learn about] contraceptives. They learned the importance of making good decisions, becoming good leaders in the future and how to share with other teenagers who do not have the opportunity to learn. Their comments included:

 ”When I decide to have sex, I will use a condom to protect myself”

Or how about this concern from Ms. Peg Herbert, the Executive Director…

As I read that, I know that the clinic near us has been out of condoms and latex gloves for weeks. How many more will get AIDS because of that? (Source)

Now, it’s true that Help Lesotho does much good and they should be commended for that.  However, they are not a Charity which is in harmony with Catholic teaching, using and approving of means that are part of the problem and certainly not the solution.  Therefore, why is OECTA supporting them?

This is an idea from Chalice to get the word out about them:

Alternatively, you could download this presentation and give it to your friends or have it shown at your Parish

A great pro-life international development group!!!

Please share with others!! We need some more Chalice CHAMPIONS in Ottawa and area!

______________

Next year for Lent, I’ve got a great idea!

During the week where D&P is scheduled for their donation in your parish, write out a cheque for Chalice and put it in the D&P Envelope.  Make sure you take a red marker and cross out D&P on the yellow envelope and write “Chalice” on it.  Let the bureacrats at the Chancery decide what they are going to do with it.

Because Development & Peace is a charity, they are required to report their financial information to the government by completing the T-3010 Charity return.  You can read Development & Peace’s compensation summary here.   The information is from their last filed return for their fiscal period ended August 31, 2010.  (Their 2011 Charity Return for their fiscal period end Aug. 31, 2011 should be up on CRA’s website any time now, since it’s due 6 months after year end.)

I have reproduced the information below for some analysis: 

When I first looked at the schedule on CRA’s website, I immediately noticed that the numbers did not appear to make sense.  If one subtracts the part-time salaries and the top 10 paid D&P positions, the average salary for the remaining D&P employees is between $57,000 and $61,000.

Something just doesn’t look right here.  The Schedule for 2009 yields similar results.  How can the average salary of a D&P employee be this high, when D&P is reporting that the 6th-10th highest paid positions are in the $40,000-$80,000 range?

I’m not sure what to make of this.  It’s a rather simple schedule to fill out (I’ve filled it out many times for the charities that I have served on).  Number of employees and the compensation that you pay them.  Pretty simple, right?   (At the top of the form, it specifically says that the number of employees (and therefore the compensation reported) should represent the number of positions the charity had, including both managerial positions and others, and should not include independent contractors.)

The only way this would make sense is if  those remaining 56 employees are also averaging $60,000 per year…which come to think of it…is really not that much of a stretch to believe for the Social Justice industry, is it? 

Socio-political activists, after all, make a good coin.

No. 

Yours truly offers his opinion over at LifeSite News.

OTTAWA, March 27, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – As LifeSiteNews reported, the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) has slashed by 65% its usual funding to the Canadian Catholic Bishops’ international aid organization, Development & Peace, for its 2011-2016 programs. It appears that the Canadian government has realized something that the Catholic bishops of Canada have not: that Development & Peace has some major problems which need an immediate and dramatic response.

The great irony, of course, is that instead of the Canadian bishops cleaning up the mess in their own backyard, the Canadian government has gone a long way in doing it for them. Caesar has decided that Development & Peace doesn’t meet the government’s standards for good stewardship of taxpayer funds. As government spokesman Justin Broekema said: “CIDA is responsible, particularly in times of fiscal restraint, for ensuring Canadian tax payers’ dollars deliver value for money and the strongest results in the lives of people in need.”

In July 2011, Socon or Bust published a comprehensive entry on how Development & Peace was doing in relation to other charities in Canada. The source of information for the entry was an article from the Summer edition of Money Sense.

 

The findings of the report were very sobering indeed for Development & Peace. In the category of Overall Charity Efficiency, Development & Peace received a grade of “C+”, the lowest of all 15 Canadian international charities, while also receiving a “C-” in Governance and Transparency, tying 3 other charities (including Amnesty International) for the lowest ranking.

Seizing on this report, LifeSiteNews readers and the Catholic blogosphere illuminated government officials as to the problems with Development & Peace. The Money Sense article (an independent and credible analysis of the international charity industry in Canada) likely had at least some influence on the cut to Development & Peace’s funding program, since the government’s stated “value for money” criteria was far from being met by the Canadian Catholic Church’s official aid and development agency.

In Embassy magazine’s follow-up article to the funding cut, there was speculation that the reduced funding might also have been related to Development & Peace’s direct involvement with the overtly political, ecumenical group, KAIROS, whose membership includes both Development & Peace (as a founding member no less) and the CCCB.

KAIROS’s funding was cut in 2009 by the Federal government because of their political advocacy against the State of Israel, as well as not meeting the conventional objectives for international aid, including providing water, health and education in developing nations. Instead, they consumed themselves, like Development & Peace did, with the latest “social justice” avante-guard causes like climate change, “eco-justice”, and the rest of the social Marxist fromage.

As with Development & Peace’s financial stewardship scandal which Money Sense exposed, Pro-Life Media, Catholic magazines and the Catholic Blogosphere reported on the close relationship between Development & Peace and KAIROS. This cozy connection between the Canadian Catholic Aid Agency and KAIROS caused some in the social justice industry to speculate openly about whether Development & Peace’s funding cut was in part responsible by their relationship with KAIROS:

“Mr. Casey said he doesn’t know whether the funding decision had anything do with the group’s advocacy work, or its membership in KAIROS. But Tony Martin, a Catholic former NDP MP and Development and Peace supporter, said he sees a connection. “The pattern is that anybody who stands up and is critical or lobbies government opposed to some of the activity of Canadian multinational corporations are going to get cut off at the knees,” he said from his home in Sault Ste. Marie, Ont. He cited the KAIROS funding decision, and another government decision in December cutting funding to the Mennonite Central Committee, which is also a member of KAIROS.” (Source)

Mr. Martin’s observation was not too far off the mark. Concerned citizens’ complaints were not only restricted to abortion, but also included objections to taxpayer money being used to fund neo-Marxist revolutionaries in the Global South by these church organizations. During its never-ending abortion drama, Development & Peace, with its sordid 40+ year history of adopting socialist sensibilities, was also caught funding neo-Marxist groups who also freely admit to being pro-abortion.

For over three years now, both Socon or Bust (my blog) and LifeSiteNews (a news service – not a blog) have discovered at least 53 groups whose aims and policies are in direct contradiction to the Catholic Church’s teaching on human life. Some groups’ aims are more heinous than others, but all of them should be disqualified from receiving any Catholic aid whatsoever.

Despite the voluminous and troubling evidence discovered thus far, most, but thankfully not all, of the Catholic bishops of this country have not sufficiently understood the systematic and deep-rooted problems with the orientation of Development & Peace. This was evidenced, for instance, by the bishops’ recent “solidarity” trip to Haiti where they were led around the island by George Soros’ pro-abort feminist shills. Do they even know who George Soros is? Remarkably, this “solidarity mission” was made after newly-elected CCCB president, Archbishop Richard Smith, asked Catholics to “trust the bishops” in October of last year.

The Church in Canada is coming to a crossroads of sorts concerning Development & Peace. This ongoing and perpetual failure to clean up Development & Peace points to something more than just Church politics and image. It points rather to a fundamental philosophical and theological error which many Canadian Bishops have adopted since the Winnipeg Statement. It’s called proportionalism.

Instead of recognizing the possibility of the intrinsic wickedness in an act, proportionalism seeks to downplay the inherent nature of an act to focus on the consequences instead. According to Blessed John Paul II, it is a teleologism which…

…by weighing the various values and goods being sought, focuses rather on the proportion acknowledged between the good and bad effects of that choice, with a view to the “greater good” or “lesser evil” actually possible in a particular situation (Veritatis Splendor).

It was this fundamental guiding error the Canadian bishops used with the Winnipeg Statement in which they said “a Catholic could contracept in good conscience”. It’s the same principle today when they are effectively telling Catholics they can give to pro-abort groups “in good conscience”.

And yet, this is not what the Church teaches at all. In 1994, Blessed John Paul II founded the Pontifical Academy for Life to promote the dignity of human life in medical science. In its statutes, it clearly says that close collaboration with medical doctors and researchers is to be encouraged, but only insofar as these doctors believe what the Church believes on the sanctity of human life:

The scientific and interdisciplinary activity of the Pontifical Academy for Life shall maintain a close connection with the bodies and institutions through which the Church is present in the world of the biomedical sciences, of health, and of healthcare organisations, also offering its collaboration to medical doctors and researchers (including those who are non-Catholics and non-Christians) who recognise that the dignity of man and the inviolability of human life from conception to natural death, as enunciated by the Magisterium of the Church, is the essential moral foundation of the science and art of medicine. (Article, 6)

If this is true for one area of Church mission, it is true for all areas of Church mission. As we can only co-operate with non-Catholic and non-Christians who share the Church’s values on the sacredness of human life in bioethics, so too is that principle no less binding in the area of human development and aid in the case of Development & Peace.

This means, of course, that the cumbaya “solidarity” missions with pro-abort feminists, anti-Catholic bigots, Marxists with masks, and the rest of the Church’s enemies embedded should be over. And so should sentiments like those of Bishop Fred Henry who said:

“The group may not be perfect but they must be doing a lot of good work even if there are a few positions and actions that we will have to challenge them on,” (Source).

No one would believe that the Catholic bishops of this country would hitch their wagon to organizations devoted to human trafficking, child pornography, or (heaven forbid!) climate change denial, despite all of the other social “good work” that they might do in the community. For some inexplicable reason, however, when the sin is about abortion or contraception, all of this other “good work” that the pro-abort pushers do somehow overrides their efforts to legalize abortion. Then, it becomes all about “walking with Jesus” or some other nonsense.

“…Msgr. Bridge told LSN said that Bishop Mulhall will continue withholding financial support to the CCODP “until the whole thing is settled with regard to the relationship between the Conference of Bishops and the Development and Peace group.” …(Source)

Bishop Mulhall is the only bishop in the Canadian Church who is completely clean and sober regarding Development & Peace.  He has broken free from the social justice koolaid.  Maybe he can share the program he used to get sober with his brother bishops.

Life has a uncanny knack to implement poetic justice. It must be Divine Providence at work.

The Development and Peace fiasco has been boiling for three years now. Think about it: the bishops had three long years to fix the problems. Plenty of time. But they didn’t. Now they have to manage a crisis because the government cut their funding.

So as the bishops express their disappointment and wring their hands about the lost money, they have only themselves to blame. Can’t say they weren’t warned. Read the rest of this entry »