Conspiracy Nation -- Vol. 7 Num. 83 ====================================== ("Quid coniuratio est?") ----------------------------------------------------------------- INVESTIGATORS "BUG" RELIGIOUS CONFESSION ======================================== Confessor and God Aren't Only Ones Listening -------------------------------------------- In CN 3.22 was brought to you Sherman Skolnick's report on how federal intelligence agencies were "bugging" the confessionals in St. Peter's Church in Chicago. Included was Mr. Skolnick's interview with an anonymous priest. Here are excerpts: PRIEST: If the Attorney General's office "bugged" our confessionals, there'd be Hell to pay! SKOLNICK: The U.S. Attorney in Chicago, who at the time was Jim Thompson. PRIEST: Well there would be *Hell* *to* *pay* if he did! I would be suspended, just that quick, if I would condone anything like that. That's absolutely a violation of the confession. And that is part of the things that any ordinary *priest* cannot violate. So if he cannot tell it himself, he certainly would not be able to permit something with which anybody else could get the information. It's against the whole, the whole teaching of the Catholic Church! I mean, the seal of confession, I mean even the Pope can't, has no right to ask a priest what he heard in confession. I mean, this has, this has been recognized by all the courts. I just can't even, I can't even *believe* that this happened, that anybody would be that *stupid*! Now comes an Associated Press story (05/11/96 in the local newspaper) about this same sort of thing having occurred in an Oregon jailhouse. Investigators, says the article, secretly tape recorded a murder suspect's confession to a Catholic priest. William Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, is quoted as saying, "It's an absolute outrage. They used this priest. They brought him in to perform the sacrament of reconciliation [confession]. And then they bugged him." The confession was heard by the Rev. Timothy Mockaitis. The suspect, Conan Wayne Hale, apparently believed that the prosecutors would not dare invade the special relation between clergy and their followers. This info is passed along as tending to corroborate Mr. Skolnick's report as contained in CN 3.22. ----------------------------------------------------------------- I encourage distribution of "Conspiracy Nation." ----------------------------------------------------------------- If you would like "Conspiracy Nation" sent to your e-mail address, send a message in the form "subscribe cn-l My Name" to listproc@cornell.edu (Note: that is "CN-L" *not* "CN-1") ----------------------------------------------------------------- For information on how to receive the improved Conspiracy Nation Newsletter, send an e-mail message to bigred@shout.net ----------------------------------------------------------------- Want to know more about Whitewater, Oklahoma City bombing, etc? (1) telnet prairienet.org (2) logon as "visitor" (3) go citcom ----------------------------------------------------------------- See also: http://www.europa.com/~johnlf/cn.html ----------------------------------------------------------------- See also: ftp.shout.net pub/users/bigred ----------------------------------------------------------------- Aperi os tuum muto, et causis omnium filiorum qui pertranseunt. Aperi os tuum, decerne quod justum est, et judica inopem et pauperem. -- Liber Proverbiorum XXXI: 8-9