Fr. Lee won the competition, winning a car -- which he kept -- and A$20,000 in prize money which he donated to a hostel for homeless men in Sydney. The priest also claims that attendance at his church increased dramatically, especially among young people, following the competition, and that he even managed to convert the strip club manager to Christianity during the time of their "incarceration". He also claimed that his bishop, the Rt Rev Kevin Manning, had approved of his involvement and even tuned in occasionally. Nonetheless, following complaints from some parishioners about the contest, Fr. Lee was suspended for a period.
Fr. Lee's latest "stunt", however, will likely result in a permanent suspension. This week, the priest stunned his congregation and readers of his weekly column in The Glenmore Gazette, by going on 7 News and revealing that he has been secretely married for over a year to a woman he met in the Philippines named Josefina and has simply been "going through the motions" of being a priest.
Fr. Lee, who has been a priest for over 20 years, said he no longer wants to live a double life. He told his interviewer that mandatory celibacy "has to go" and that he knows too many other priests who are falling down and, like himself, living double lives. He is promising to write a tell-all book on the subject. His final newspaper column, not yet available online, is a public apology to his parishioners.
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2 comments:
Well now i have written the book and published it. Please try to buy a copy and read it before the culprits manage to suppress this story. The time for optional celibacy is now and all the evidence in my book will prove that its highly unlikely that many priests in Australia are living the celibate vows they profess.
see unholysilence.com
I am unable to speak on any Catholic property as a result of outing corrupt practices in the Church and attempting to subvert the man-made law of clerical celibay and writing the book "Unholy Silence" which identified systematic coverups and payment of hush-money to victims. I am firmly committed to my Catholic faith and as a priest, I only want the Church to realise why it is losing so many adherents. It has less to do with the difficulty of accepting moral authority and more to do with moral contradictions in the Church. You can read my book by going to www.unholysilence.com
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