8 Comments
User's avatar
Al Fieds's avatar

You should have waited with this until you had the priests version. Very one sided

Expand full comment
Dan Sealana's avatar

He's had over a year to respond but hasn't.

Expand full comment
Al Fieds's avatar

And now you step in, with the full force of arbitrariness. You shouldn’t be doing this. Pray for those people, the priest and that lady but don’t add oil to the fire. What is your involvement in this story anyway ? Hope you know what you are doing

God bless you

Expand full comment
Dan Sealana's avatar

You a priest abuse enabler. I hope you know what YOU are doing.

Expand full comment
Mary Suddath's avatar

Good grief. Didn’t that poor lady have any female friends that she could’ve told about this? Everything screams red flags!

Expand full comment
MacKillop Coalition's avatar

Other members of the adult conduct advisory board (at the time) who should have recused themselves due to direct connections to Fr. Jim Rolph's high school (FGRH) or former parish (Christ The King Ann Arbor): Al Kresta, Brian Garred, and Dr. Rusty Chavey. As the commenter below states, how is it possible for Therese Cirner to properly assess these cases when she comes from a community that normalizes it?

Expand full comment
JM's avatar

This is not meant to call into question the current Diocesan Advisory Council vice-chair's qualifications or overall character as she is fairly well known locally as a woman of good standing. But can the diocese comment whether Therese Cirner recused herself from this case or recuses herself from others involving charismatic healing and deliverance?

The council statutes mention "any other circumstance that involves the appearance of a substantial conflict of interest". Cirner's spouse co-authored the book "Deliverance from Evil Spirits", Cirner was a former handmaid in Ann Arbor's charismatic Word of God covenant community, and the Cirners spent considerable time at Franciscan University in Steubenville. Do any of these individually or taken together qualify as conflict of interest that merits recusal when evaluating cases involving healing ministries or deliverance? The perception of appropriate boundaries for charismatics may differ considerably from those of standard Catholics in general.

Can the diocese describe what they view ARE appropriate boundaries for healing ministries when it comes to physical touch (head? shoulder? back? arm? knee?) during healing ministry and what constitutes spiritual abuse? Especially in the case of a non-charismatic visiting a charismatic priest for healing or deliverance and not knowing what to expect.

Expand full comment
Leaving Bulwark's avatar

Yet another instance of "deliverance ministry" from charismatic circles leading to spiritual abuse. Not of Catholic origin and not part of the earliest Catholic "baptism of the spirit" experiences but introduced separately from Pentecostals early in the charismatic renewal. "Unbound" from Neal Lozano may be a domesticated form that's tamer than others, but even domestic animals can bite and scratch.

Nadja's story sounds similar to "breakthrough ministry" that caused a huge scandal in the early 1970s in South Bend at the True House community. Breaking down a person gradually to rebuild, burning of objects--much more extreme than any regular Unbound session. https://www.nytimes.com/1975/08/10/archives/catholic-pentecostals-charged-with-unauthorized-exorcisms.html

More recently, this also resonates with recent issues with deliverance at Franciscan University of Steubenville covered at https://jennmorson.substack.com.

Now Lansing. Plus this priest is doing these deliverances one on one and not in a group? No...

Expand full comment