Hi, Legionary of Christ here. Thanks for all the reporting, you folks at the Pillar are the best. About those last couple of paragraphs (and even though everyone will say I am biased haha), I can truly say that our order has undergone a profound reform, and it's really beautiful to see the spirit that reigns among my brother Legionaries.…
Hi, Legionary of Christ here. Thanks for all the reporting, you folks at the Pillar are the best. About those last couple of paragraphs (and even though everyone will say I am biased haha), I can truly say that our order has undergone a profound reform, and it's really beautiful to see the spirit that reigns among my brother Legionaries. Reform is never fully over of course - Ecclesia semper reformanda - but being obedient to the Church really saved us and I'm really excited about the future. Thanks again for all the awesome reporting!
I clicked into the comments transparently to comment on the LC situation. I’m replying to you directly because you’ve also commented on it.
I have always been of the opinion that the Legion ought to have been suppressed ages ago, but that the “ship has sailed” and thankfully most of the rot has (apparently) been dealt with.
But I feel like in some ways the success of the LC in reforming itself has the unintended consequences of stifling suppressions that need to happen, because now other new orders founded by bad actors or falling under leadership who are corrupt can point to the Legion and say, “Look! They fixed themselves, we can too!”
And I just don’t care for that state of affairs. I don’t think at this point it makes sense to suppress Maciel’s organization, but I do think the Legion needs to be treated as more of a cautionary warning of an order that should have been dealt with differently and is not on any way an exemplar of “what went right.”
My strong suspicion is that the vast majority of the good priests in the Legion would have been good priests outside of it, and the real lesson we should learn is probably that suppressing the order wouldn’t have left the church any worse off because those good men simply would have gone elsewhere, but that even now there are probably small ways in which a poorly founded group continues to be haunted and corrupted by an ill start.
Thanks for replying to my comment. Honestly, the fact that we're still around, with our founder and his terrible sins and crimes, is a story for us Legionaries of being redeemed. We could have been suppressed, but we were not. And because we can't look to our founder for inspiration, the consequence has been: look at Christ, put the focus on him.
I'm glad I don't have to be the one to make the call about troubled orders and movements being suppressed or not. It must be so hard for these people when that happens, I can't imagine. In our case, the Church's judgement was that our charism is a genuine gift of God, and we should keep going forward.
Thanks for the comment! Obviously the Legion will come up in stories like this, because the Legion story is the best known of religious orders with similar histories, but just to be clear, we're not advocating for or against.
Completely agree. I am grateful to the Legionaries who are a true band of brothers, strong priests with true love for Christ, the Blessed Mother, and the Church. My son attends the LC apostolic school which is a minor seminary and Maciel is never mentioned or quoted there. The one time he was mentioned was during the summer program in which the boys were discerning whether they wanted to attend the school. They were told about the crimes of Maciel to help them in their decision process. My son decided to attend and he loves being there because the priests there are the best group of strong Christian men I have ever seen who can serve as role models for my teenage son.
Hi, Legionary of Christ here. Thanks for all the reporting, you folks at the Pillar are the best. About those last couple of paragraphs (and even though everyone will say I am biased haha), I can truly say that our order has undergone a profound reform, and it's really beautiful to see the spirit that reigns among my brother Legionaries. Reform is never fully over of course - Ecclesia semper reformanda - but being obedient to the Church really saved us and I'm really excited about the future. Thanks again for all the awesome reporting!
I clicked into the comments transparently to comment on the LC situation. I’m replying to you directly because you’ve also commented on it.
I have always been of the opinion that the Legion ought to have been suppressed ages ago, but that the “ship has sailed” and thankfully most of the rot has (apparently) been dealt with.
But I feel like in some ways the success of the LC in reforming itself has the unintended consequences of stifling suppressions that need to happen, because now other new orders founded by bad actors or falling under leadership who are corrupt can point to the Legion and say, “Look! They fixed themselves, we can too!”
And I just don’t care for that state of affairs. I don’t think at this point it makes sense to suppress Maciel’s organization, but I do think the Legion needs to be treated as more of a cautionary warning of an order that should have been dealt with differently and is not on any way an exemplar of “what went right.”
My strong suspicion is that the vast majority of the good priests in the Legion would have been good priests outside of it, and the real lesson we should learn is probably that suppressing the order wouldn’t have left the church any worse off because those good men simply would have gone elsewhere, but that even now there are probably small ways in which a poorly founded group continues to be haunted and corrupted by an ill start.
Thanks for replying to my comment. Honestly, the fact that we're still around, with our founder and his terrible sins and crimes, is a story for us Legionaries of being redeemed. We could have been suppressed, but we were not. And because we can't look to our founder for inspiration, the consequence has been: look at Christ, put the focus on him.
I'm glad I don't have to be the one to make the call about troubled orders and movements being suppressed or not. It must be so hard for these people when that happens, I can't imagine. In our case, the Church's judgement was that our charism is a genuine gift of God, and we should keep going forward.
Thanks for the comment! Obviously the Legion will come up in stories like this, because the Legion story is the best known of religious orders with similar histories, but just to be clear, we're not advocating for or against.
And really, thanks for the comment.
Isn't this Pillar community just great!
Completely agree. I am grateful to the Legionaries who are a true band of brothers, strong priests with true love for Christ, the Blessed Mother, and the Church. My son attends the LC apostolic school which is a minor seminary and Maciel is never mentioned or quoted there. The one time he was mentioned was during the summer program in which the boys were discerning whether they wanted to attend the school. They were told about the crimes of Maciel to help them in their decision process. My son decided to attend and he loves being there because the priests there are the best group of strong Christian men I have ever seen who can serve as role models for my teenage son.