Dissident Priest is on Sabbatical to Anglican Monastery for Year: Discipline?

Edit: since attacking the Church during the campaign on behalf of marriage which was promoted heavily by the Diocese, involving the prayer, expense and personal time by many in the Diocese, Father Bob Pierson O.S.B. had taken it upon himself to challenge traditional Church teaching and attack that campaign.


Father Pierson is a monk at the decaying Monastery of St. John's in Collegeville Minnesota who has done a lot of things he will one day have to answer for.


He has also been known for other offenses in the past, for example,  he resigned from his job as Campus Minister at Saint John's University when Pope Benedict announced new norms (which are generally ignored in most places) about formation for priests in the seminary, that they may not have deep seated problems with respect to homosexuality.

In the last year, he also hosted a naked retreat which would involve "touching". At the time, we felt that  it was the surfacing of one of the previous Abbot's methods of instruction for his novices, whom he insisted on interviewing in the nude.

Then, Pierson seems to have gotten himself banned from speaking in the Archdiocese of Minneapolis and St. Paul, where the Archbishop told him not to speak any longer in his jurisdiction, as a result of attacking the Archbishop's defense of marriage initiative.  That didn't stop Father Pierson from continuing to speak in other parts of the United Stats, and to use his Facebook page to promote his anti-Catholic agenda.

Now, Father Bob Pierson's Facebook page is down and he's on sabbatical for a year at an Anglican Monastery called Holy Cross in West Park, New York.  We hope that he decides not to return after his "sabbatical" and hope that his stay in Holy Cross becomes permanent, barring a dramatic road to Damascus of some kind for this persecutor of Christians.  It would be nice if it were more obvious that this was some part of a disciplinary action on the part of someone.  There's no indication it is, but hopefully, Pierson will follow through with his occasional threat and find the more doctrinally suitable, if unsound, Anglican communion his permanent home from now on.

Link to photo...

Benedictine Monastery Continues to Promote Homoheresy

Edit: the Guesthouse Master at the Modernist Monastery in Collegeville is speaking publicly against chastity and the teachings of the Catholic Faith. When he’s not attacking the Archbishop’s efforts to defend the Catholic Family, he’s promoting nude retreats, and getting away with it despite repeated warnings from the local ordinary.

Courageous  [sic] priest joins us in February to uphold church teaching on the fundamental call to show respect and compassion for LGBTQ persons. 

Fr. Bob Pierson, a Benedictine priest out of the Collegeville MN Abbey in Minnesota, stood forth publicly last summer to emphasize the primacy of the informed conscience in respect to voting on Minnesota's marriage amendment. Since then he's been barred from several dioceses in Minnesota. He'll join us in this QCF conversation to speak also of the church teaching to show respect, love and compassion to our LGBTQ sisters and brothers, and to resist unjust discrimination. How is the whole church challenged by these teachings? 

The conversation begins at 9:00 EASTERN, Tuesday, February 26, 2013. Attendace is free, as usual, and all are invited to submit live questions and comments during the hour.
When 

February 26th, 2013 9:00 PM   through   10:00 PM

Link to “DignityUSA” site...

Dissidents Disparage Catholic Faith Despite Archbishop's Words

"Father" Bob Pierson at "Gay Prom"

Edit: There was a lot of controversy a few months ago when a Benedictine guest master at St. John's Abbey in Collegeville wanted to host a nude retreat with a strange nude guru who threatened to "touch" people.   The retreat was cancelled, but the man who made the retreat continues to be a priest in good standing with the Archdiocese and the Order of Saint Benedict headed by the Rock Abbot, Notker Wolf.

Fr. Pierson was born on December 29, 1955 and  graduated from St. John's University in 1978. He was ordained on 2, June 1984.

He's famous in the past for resigning from his campus ministry position at St. John's University when the Pope announced some increased standards for seminarians.  Homosexuals were to be excluded.  The ruling was later softened, but Fr. Bob Pierson insisted on sticking to his guns.

Last year, he even found time to attend a "gay prom".

Since then, he's been toted by the media barons, like the anti-Catholic Huffington Post, as a "Gay Priest" which prompted some stern words from the local ordinary, Archbishop Nienstedt.

Despite the fact that Fr. Pierson identifies himself alternatively as "Epsicopalian" on his Facebook, he is still in good standing.  Indeed, he approves of and has even posted an open letter to the Archbishop by a Lutheran Lay-Bishop.

Despite all of these antics, and many others that go on at St. John's, theAbbey website still describes him as a Catholic monk in good standing, to whom it falls the task of creating an inviting, welcoming and caring environment for visitors to the Monastery.  It's a pretty tall order for anyone to make that badly wreckovated place look inviting.  The poured concrete Abbey Church is a significant pile of brutal concrete, designed by Jewish architect Marcel Breuer. It looks nothing like a Catholic Church and actually more closely resembles a Buddhist temple.  Still, irony of ironies, Father Pierson is in good standing with the Catholic Church and many local people, albeit a shrinking number, have been fooled into believing that the Abbey, the monk, his very public and scandalous declarations, are Catholic.

Despite all of this, more recently, the Benedictine told the tale that he'd been advised by Archbishop John Nienstedt to stay out of his Archdiocese.  Despite what looks like a very stern warning, the errant priest and one of his cohorts, Father Mark Tegeder, continue to work with wheelchair organizations like CALGM   and CPCSM which have been unwelcome in the Archdiocese in the past.

They also continue to be very public in attacking the Archbishop's marriage amendment.  Indeed, despite repeated warnings, including a pointed e-mail to Father Mark Tegeder, the priest has continued to speak publicly, to the glee of the local anti-Catholic Star.

Last fall, Nienstedt told priests and deacons that he expected them to support the marriage amendment and that "there ought not be open dissension on this issue."

He had more specific instructions for the Rev. Mike Tegeder, priest at St. Frances Cabrini Church in Minneapolis who's been a rare internal, public critic of the church on this issue.

"If you choose not to offer your resignation, but continue to act openly or speak publicly about your opposition to Church teaching, I will suspend your faculties to exercise ministry and remove you from your ministerial assignments," Nienstedt wrote to Tegeder in a letter last November.

Asked why the archbishop hasn't removed Tegeder, given the priest's continued public criticism, spokesman Jim Accurso said the archdiocese doesn't comment on personnel matters. More generally, Accurso said, "we are not aware of a single incident where the conduct of an employee regarding the marriage amendment has raised the issue of discipline."

Nienstedt has declined Pioneer Press requests to be interviewed about the marriage question.

To Tegeder, Nienstedt's push is "putting things really out of kilter."

What threatens marriage most is a bad economy and divorce, he said. Trying to deny a small percentage of people with homosexual orientations the right to have committed relationships under law "seems to be cruel."

"That's the odd thing about Nienstedt's making a big issue out of this. There's a small percent of gay people, but what is it, 50 percent of marriages break down or something? Using the constitution to do what he says he's doing, defending marriage, it's like using a bazooka to kill a fly. You're going to get all kinds of collateral damage; you're not doing what you're trying to accomplish."

Modernist Abbey Still Defies Archbishop Nienstedt

Edit: St. John's Abbey has recently come out in favor of the Marriage Amendment, but not really. Archbishop Nienstedt has been courageously encouraging all Minnesotans to defend Marriage, while some of his own clergy and professed Monks in Collegeville are undercutting his authority and insulting the Catholic Faith. While they insist that they support Marriage, they don't explicitly advocate a vote for "yes" and undercut the message by wingding about how different types of people have different struggles.

Of course, they mean Father Bob Pierson, among others, who was asked to lie low but continues to speak against the Archbishop's witness in defense of marriage. The Abbey refuses to discipline him or any of the others like him who make a mockery of the Church's teachings by their support for sodomy.

We'd written earlier this month about Father Piersn's continuing defiance of the Archbishop's defense of marriage.

Here's the Abbey's passive aggressive non-statement. It's actually worse than if they'd said nothing at all:

Marriage amendment in Minnesota

As a Catholic institution we take the proposed amendment to the Minnesota constitution as an opportunity "to witness to our conviction that marriage is a vital part of the social fabric" that needs support and attention. By doing this we hope to put the marriage amendment into a larger context that acknowledges the challenges that people face in reconciling their faith commitments with a variety of other positions in the culture.

Individual members of the monastic community do have individual opinions regarding this and other political, social and even moral issues under discussion in our society. Individual monks may express their personal views on such issues based on their own freedom of conscience, though in doing so, they do not necessarily represent the opinion or view of the abbey. In this situation, the individual speaks for himself only.

As an institution we strive to ensure that whatever takes place under our auspices be consistent with the integrity of the Church's teaching on marriage. We wish to witness to unity, respect, and peace, even in the midst of challenging emotions and differing ideas on this matter.

Archbishop Nienstedt Puts Pressure on Lavender Basilica

Edit: In the past, the Lavender Basilica has been resisting the Archbishop's initiatives, keeping an ambiguous presence at Minneapolis' depraved Gay Pride Festival and fostering an atmosphere of disobedience to the Archbishop and opposition to the Catholic Church's teachings on a variety of issues. On Friday, there was a giant puff piece giving a lot of attention to some of the usual suspects on the subject of the Defense of Marriage Act that is up for a vote in the state of Minnesota in the anti-Catholic 'MinnPost'.   There is some resistance from 17 parishes in the Archdiocese, the most dissident and substantial is the Basilica of St. Mary's, to the Archbishop's initiative, but there is also a loss of nerve.

There is a presence on Facebook of "Catholics" who say "No" , which has a list of parishes resisting the Archbishop, but it only boasts about five hundred souls, many coming from the Lavender Basilica of St. Mary's, which is the Archdiocese's Co-Cathedral.  Yet even at this place, the pressure is increasing and there was a flier included in this week's church bulletin, complained one of the Basilica's parishioners on the Facebook group:

Another dissident is Father Bob Pierson whom the Archbishop doesn't want teaching in the Archdiocese any longer and is keeping his mouth shut for now, except that the Tribune did cite him.

Archbishop Nienstedt is still remaining firm on the issue.  He's getting one of the most dissident parishes to get the message out and others will soon be following in their continued efforts to get the message out.  His statement for the MinnPoste was as follows:

“But the reality is that marriage is not ours to redefine, just as another human life is not ours to take,” the archbishop continues. “God is both the author of life and the author of marriage. It is this most fundamental understanding of the natural order that animates who we are as Catholics. ... It is also why we fight to defend God’s plan for marriage, because his providence is as clear for what marriage is as it is for the dignity of each human life. ...

At present, the Archdiocese has given $1 million to defend marriage, something which should be encouraging to local conservative protestants and conservatives in general who don't want to see society further eroded by such legislation.

There's also no word from the noxious Father Mike Tegeder.  He's not even mentioned in this article.

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Modernist Abbey Steeped in Dissent and Deceit

Edit: We received a post from an observant reader about the "Catholic Association of Lesbian Gay Ministry".  This  is the same organization which was forbidden from using a Catholic parish in the Archdiocese of St. Paul last February as reported by Lifesite News:

MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota, February 23, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Fr. Leo Tibesar, a Catholic priest, was scheduled to host an upcoming Catholic Association of Lesbian and Gay Ministries (CALGM) Fund Raising dinner at his parish in Minneapolis later this month, until the event was suddenly cancelled yesterday.
 Fr. Leo Tibesar, dubbed a “well known and highly respected Same Sex Marriage and Gay Rights Activist” in official event announcements, has openly supported and been actively involved in movements that oppose the Catholic Church on the issues of marriage and homosexuality for many years.

The organizer of the event, a Father Bob Pierson is the treasurer for the sponsoring organization which features gay marriage.  Elizabeth D really summed it up beautifully, how this entire thing is interconnected and very much alive in the Archdiocese and the Monastery of St. John's in Collegeville.

The monk Fr Bob Pierson who was the contact person for this retreat is also Tresurer for the sponsoring organization "Catholic Association of Lesbian and Gay Ministry" and almost all the other board members of this group can be verified online to be involved in other organizations explicitly in favor of homosexual "marriage"; at least one board member (an "inferfaith minister") performs same sex ceremonies. Based on web searching, the retreat leader Bob Pileggi is apparently a fallen away Catholic, has been a staff member of the pro-gay-marriage "Lambda Legal Defense Fund" for outreach and as coordinator of "The Marriage Project", and he also offers his services as an interfaith minister conducting custom weddings and other ceremonies clearly including same sex "weddings".

According to the Abbey website, Father Bob Pierson is:

Father Robert Pierson OSB Born in Estherville, Iowa, 29 December 1955; ordained 2 June 1984 Father Robert earned his bachelor's degree in social science from Saint John's University and master of divinity degree from Saint John's University School of Theology/Seminary. He has served as a pastor, seminary rector, director of field education, spiritual director, vocations director, chaplain, director of campus ministry, faculty resident, member of the Saint John's Abbey Schola, cantor and abbey fireman.

Selected quotes and stories about Father Bob Pierson who organized this event:

On the Catholic Church, he writes in the Pray, Tell blog:

There are aspects of our life as a Church that need to die so that we can experience the power of the resurrected life that God holds out to us this Easter Day.

Father Pierson also lost his composure when an instruction was released in 2005 disallowing homosexuals from being in the priesthood.  He was justifiably ridiculed by Diogenes at Catholic Culture after Pierson resigned from the Campus Ministry at St. John's:  Brother Reinhart incredibly called the dissenting priest "courageous" and a man of "integrity".   Here's part of the what Father Pierson wrote:

"For quite some time I have wrestled with conflicting teaching by the church -- that gays and lesbians are to be respected, but that somehow we are not fit for work in the church," said Pierson, who announced his decision in an e-mail message Wednesday to staff and students.
"But with the new teaching, which says gay men are 'objectively disordered' and cannot relate properly to men and women, it became clear to me that I cannot continue in campus ministry," Pierson said.
"For me, I have decided that I am not disordered, that I can be an effective celibate gay priest, that I can relate effectively with men and women," he said. "I have chosen not to be dishonest about my thoughts and feelings, and to resign."

Despite frequent and vociferous dissent from Catholic teaching, Father Pierson, like many others at they moribund Benedictine Abbey continue their scandalous behavior and are permitted by superiors of all kinds to persist in creating a poisonous habitat for the students and laity they are supposed to be serving.