On day four of a week’s worth of posts dedicated to focusing on the good things Bishop Zurek has done, I propose the bringing to the Amarillo Diocese a tradition that dates back to the High Middle Ages as…
Good #4-the Red Mass
Ladies and gentlemen, help us to dream again. Create an environment in which we can have visions. Be the ones who cry out today, “I have a dream!”
From Bishop Zurek’s homily from the second Red Mass in 2012.
The tenth Red Mass will be celebrated on Tuesday, Oct. 19 at 6:30pm at St. Mary’s Cathedral, 1200 South Washington.
“Inasmuch as there could be serious legal implications for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles if we do fully disclose to you our concern regarding the Reverend John Salazar, Sch.P., by this letter I am informing you that the Reverend John Salazar, Sch.P. would never be allowed to minister as a priest in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in any way whatsoever given the circumstances of his case.”
From a 1991 letter from the Archdiocese of Los Angeles to the Diocese of Amarillo prior to Bishop’s Matthiesen’s bringing of John Salazar to the Diocese of Amarillo. Bishop Matthiesen ignored this warning. Later he defended the “serious mistake” by stating that he never conducted his own checks of the priests – which included the Rev. John Salazar-Jimenez, and that it wasn’t until 10 years later that he learned some priests were not the first-time sex offenders that they purported to be when he agreed to hire.
A Memorial in the Grotto of St. Mary’s Cathedral raised by Monsignor Waldow during Bishop Yanta’s episcopacy. Monsignor Waldow wrote:
“In memory of the death of innocence of the victims of clergy sexual abuse. When innocence dies…a life stops. It is essential that we never forget.”
