When we are in Baltimore, we often go to the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Towson. The pastor, Father Joe Barr, is an energetic priest and the masses are more than tolerable. One of his assistants is (or was until this weekend) the Rev. Mark Bullock.
Alas, the Baltimore Sun had this story:
According to a police report of the incident, Mark Stewart Bullock, 47, was at Bush River Books & Movies, an Abingdon adult store on the 3900 block of Pulaski Highway, the night of Jan. 16, when two deputies, investigating complaints of indecent exposure, discovered him nude from the waist down in a movie theater inside the shop.
Bullock was sitting on a couch with “his pants completely off,” stated the report, which went on to state that “Bullock was not wearing any underwear and [was] exposing his penis.” He was sitting in a public area where store customers could see him, sheriff’s deputies said.
The “bookstore” had become very popular.
Monica Worrell, a spokeswoman for the Harford County Sheriff’s Office, said deputies routinely look in on adult bookstores to ensure they are complying with the law. This particular shop was drawing more traffic than normal, according to community members, who had voiced concerns at a council meeting, leading the sheriff’s office to investigate.
“Throughout the course of doing that, we found violations of law,” Worrell said. Several arrests were made, she said.
My knowledge of Bullock was limited to occasional Sunday masses that he celebrated.
The priests of the parish, aware of Catholics’ tendency to lapse into alpha sleep at the start of a sermon, have tried to make the homilies more interesting.
He was a good preacher. Bullock gave a Christmas sermon on the contrast between the hymn we has just sung, O Little Town of Bethlehem, and his visit to a military-occupied Bethlehem in which he had a submachine gun pointed at him. He has a good singing voice and sang the verses of the hymn as he commented on them. His point was that Shalom transcends earthly notions of peace.
But he, like many men, has problems with the virtue of chastity, and is totally lacking in the minor virtue of discretion. Pornography, a temptation to many men, including priests and pastors, is available on-line, and it is difficult to understand why he had to go to a “bookstore” to see it. Perhaps he was seeking the thrill of danger, of being caught. Perhaps, as the police seem to suspect, the “bookstore” was a front for other activities.
I am familiar through literature and through my former career as an investigator how sexual passion can distort a man’s judgment and cause him to do things out of character. Whether Bullock can be rehabilitated I do not know. The Archdiocese is short of priests, and apart from this personal vice he seemed to function as a good priest. The question is whether Bullock is a sinner, who can repent, or has such deep psychological compulsions that he cannot be trusted in a pastoral role. I suspect that the Archdiocese, having been badly burned by its mishandling of pedophilia (which this case is not), will permanently suspend Bullock.
Update
A few more pieces of information about Father Bullock:
He was a life long member of St. Clare’s in Essex, a working class area of Baltimore County. He studied at St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore. He is now 47, and was ordained in 2006. Before entering the seminary, he was a floral designer.
St. Mary’s is known internationally as the Pink Palace. The Archdiocese says it has ended the homosexual subculture as St Mary’s, which culture the Archdiocese it also insists never existed in the first place. Of course it did. I know people who went to St Mary’s, and many of the students there were actively gay in the 1960s and 970s.
When I went to hear a lecture by Raymond Brown in the seminary chapel I sat in front of a women Presbyterian minister and some St. Mary’s faculty. He told them that she wanted to take a course in Celtic Spirituality that Father X had give. They informed her that Father X was not teaching at the moment. He had been sleeping with the seminary students and insisted upon flaunting it too openly. His bishop had sent him to rural Pennsylvania to cool off.
Local opinion is that gay seminarians are sent to St. Mary’s in Baltimore and straight students to St. Mary’s in Emmitsburg.
Bullock was also conservative liturgically. He said a beautiful and reverent mass, and if I remember correctly, chanted the eucharistic prayer on several occasions. Older liberals claim that the new crop of priests are both more conservative and more homosexual than the older liberal generation. There is some evidence to support that claim. There is High Anglican precedent for the phenomenon.
BTW, a long as a homosexual priest is 1. chaste 2.not effeminate, I think few people would ever care.
From the perspective of being a mother, I don’t want a man like that anywhere near my children, neither as a priest nor as any other profession where one has to place one’s trust in regard to children.
Rehabilitation is not the issue. Once a sexual deviancy is uncovered that should automatically exempt someone from any such capacity because even the risk of one incident is unacceptable.
It boggles my mind that clerical pychologists talk about reasonable risk in allowing offending priests to continue in ministry, as if, gosh, he rapes one more child, then well, that is when we will have to do something about him.
Aside from the risk issue, this man, even without having molested children or just plain being a sexual deviant, should be stripped of his priesthood. We keep trying to protect the holiness of the priesthood by keeping perverts in collars when the best way to protect it is to remove them.
This is really sad. It seems to me that Baltimore has an unusually high number of priests accused of misconduct, i.e. 64 for the population, i.e. 2.6 million.
The man certainly is on the verge of a mental breakdown and needs help. Let us pray for him.
There’s a bigger problem than Bullock’s behavior (which certainly is a problem in itself). The problem is the lack of any internal structures within the Catholic Church to hold priests accountable for their behavior. Canon Law is routinely ignored. The whole concept of alter Christus, instead of reminding priests of their responsibility to be holy, instead encourages priests to think of themselves as “above it all.”
There are even bigger problems. In the Catholic Church, the Holy Spirit is ignored as the sanctifying Agent for a Christian. The theology about divine redemption is, for all intents and purposes, ignored. The Holy Spirit is relegated to a theological backwater, instead of being viewed as the Comforter and Advocate that Christ described Him to be. As a result, ideas of personal holiness are limited to “solidarity” with the poor, opposing abortion and contraception, and supporting the bishops’ political agendas.
This is why Catholicism in the developed world is dying. Its leaders — including the current Pope (see “Caritas in Veritae”) — are more interested in maintaining secular prestige and political power than in communicating the faith accurately and passionately to billions of laymen. We are seeing the results.
Hello, I’m a reporter at the Baltimore Sun. I am trying to reach the author of this post but cannot find your contact information. Would you please email me at alisonk@baltsun.com? Thanks in advance.
Sad? No. Bad.
Misconduct? No, sins.
Verge of a mental breakdown? Good grief.
This behavior has been culturally almost normalized, even if it is still, thankfully, criminal.
And the performing during the sermon is a big red flag. Self-referent, theatrical, narcissistic (even the “I had an UZI pointed at me!” remark)…..Have all of us lost all of our ability to see red flags?
I know a priest who is “perfect.” He has gradually become perfectly orthodox, if inane and vacuous, in his sermons. He says the Liturgy perfectly….carefully…..but as if telling you these are the words rather than praying them. He loves the sound of his own voice, and sings all the time. He is very well groomed, and lets people do all the traditional devotions they want. There are other signs – many cruises and trips, gold lame decor, making himself, not the Lord, the focus of the Mass. Why was I not surprised when someone told me her unnamed friend left the parish because the friend’s child was propositioned? Why won’t Mama report this incident? Why does everybody love him?
MILLIONS of men r addicted to pornography, some of them r priest like father Mark Bullock.
Let’s pray 4 all our priest.
OH Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.
The Process
1) Really dumb error
2) police are called
3) Doleful message to parishioners
4) Suspension of faculties
5) Psyhological testing
6) Assigned period of reflection
7) Priest never heard from again
8) Life goes on as if it never happened
Joseph, a priest friend of mine from India told me that charismatic renewal is having a Huge impact on the Church in his country. Thousands come to weekend retreats open to healing and the exercise of spiritual gifts. Apparently, the renewal is also very strong in Latin America (one half of Catholics there are said to be charismatic). Whatever one thinks of charismatic renewal (I’m favorable), it is something that has to be taken seriously. I wonder how it fits into the equations of Benedict and other leaders in Rome.
Father Michael, I know the pope made some comments about these emerging movements. Publicly, he said that the Church is not sure what to make of them. Personally, I think he’s scared of them because they don’t fit into his nice, neat theological equations.
I think we have seen that a priest’s reverence at Mass is not entirely an accurate indicator of whether he’s an all-around decent priest or not. Perhaps the days of openly flaunting gayness in the seminary is over but the behavior obviously is still going on. I know a priest who left a “traditional” priestly society because of the group’s worldliness and homosexuality. One of the society priests got into trouble in Wisconsin for tying up a teenage boy in bed. I think the fact of the matter is that there is so much homosexuality in the Church that it has invaded pretty much every order and section of the Church, although some areas undoubtedly have suffered more than others.
If there is a part of the “Third Secret of Fatima” which hasn’t been revealed, I wonder whether it concerned the spread of active homosexuality in the clergy. Indeed it would be most interesting to know whether Pope John XXIII issued his widely ignored instruction that those with “tendencies to homosexuality or pederasty” not be admitted to seminaries, after having read the third secret.
Joseph D’Hippolito,
Joseph Ratzinger, in The Ratzinger Report, had positive things to say about the Charismatic Renewal. This book first became available in the U.S. in 1985.
It’s not sad, it’s evil. It’s not misconduct; it’s a crime. He is not on the verge of a mental breakdown; his behavior is considered normal and comical, if still criminal. The help he needs is the reality check he may have just received. His problem is not just one of chastity. His narcissism from the pulpit is flagrant (both the singing and the machine gun story). And I would say that the hyper-reverence of the Mass is narcissistic also. I am sorry, but too many of us, especially men, know when a guy is homosexual even when he is chaste and not effeminate. It’s a personality disorder before any of those, a severe neurosis, and will shine out in other ways.
Can you imagine if someone exposed himself to your child and his bishop said, “Pray for him. He has a problem with chastity and needs to work on that virtue.”
Good grief!
TheAltonRoute, your first sentences is especially spot-on. regardless of whether it refers to homosexuality or child abuse. I’ll never forget the day of my mom’s funeral Mass in 2009. God gave me the power to be the lector at all the readings (except the Gospel) and to be calm during the Mass, reception and graveside ceremony. When I got back to the church, I wept profusely (I was very close to my mother). The priest who said the Mass (who is also the pastor) came in unexpectedly and viewed my weeping as somehow unmanly (this was a man in his late 60s, who had just arrived three months earlier). He dealt with me in a very clinical, callous manner. He never once offered to pray with or for me. The next day, I wrote the angriest e-mail I ever wrote to him. I told him that I would no longer attend that church (which had been my home church since childhood) as long as he was the pastor, and that he was dead to me. I also sent complaints to the bishop and to the head of his order.
If a priest is supposed to be alter Christus, then he should at least have the kind of compassion and sensitivity toward the hurting that the real Christus had. Sadly, too many priests and bishops see Catholicism as more of an intellectual and political exercise than a spiritual one.
I heard a sermon recently that addressed the question of child-abusing priests. It said, “They are weak. We are all weak. It is our fault because we don’t support lonely priests enough. We are called to forgive seventy times seven.” Not a word about repentance or about reparation or about scandal or about the victims. And He twisted the words of Christ for every point.
Mary, I think that you are right about the narcissism, although it was not of the especially obnoxious variety. Sometimes it is helpful when a priest talks about his personal experiences in a sermon; but of course a narcissist loves to do that sort of thing. I also appreciate priests with good singing voices; but then a narcissist loves to show off his singing voice, if he has one. The things a good priest and preacher will sometimes do will also be done by a narcissist.
I believe Jonathan Edwards always read his sermons in dull monotone so that any emotional effect on the hearer would not be because of his delivery but because of the Holy Spirit. Edwards was as self-effacing as possible; perhaps he sensed the dangers of narcissism in a preacher’s life.
“It is our fault because we don’t support lonely priests enough. We are called to forgive seventy times seven.”
Mary, sad to say, those words reflect the typical Catholic technique for dealing with laypeople who pose difficult questions to priests and bishops: Put them on a guilt trip that will divert attention from the actual problem. This is not only devious but despicable.
As far as lonliness is concerned, a lot of us are lonely. Not too many of us molest children to relieve that lonliness, I would say.
Mary, you should file a formal, written complaint with your bishop about that priest’s words.
This is another example of the Catholic Church is de facto apostate.
“Joseph Ratzinger, in The Ratzinger Report, had positive things to say about the Charismatic Renewal. This book first became available in the U.S. in 1985.”
That was 20 years before he became Pope, and he is going into his 12th year in that position. His views might have changed, given that he has a far fuller view of the Universal Church now than he did then.
Mary, the guy doesn’t get it at all. I recently heard a priest tell a large group that it’s the fault of the laity if a priest gets into trouble because they’re not praying for their pastors enough. A well known lay theologian was sitting next to me and looked at me with an expression that said “He couldn’t have said what I think I heard him say…could he?” Incredible, just incredible.”
I’ve actually found people are generally poor at picking out homosexuals who aren’t effeminate or “queer acting”. I’m thinking of guys I knew in seminary who later came out, etc. who no one guessed; as well as men in parishes where I’ve served who totally shocked me and others when they revealed themselves. One the father of two and a factory worker with arms like my thighs.
Joseph,
Ratzinger, as Benedict XVI, has praised the Charismatic Renewal on several occasions. Here are two instances. The following link is a letter to Catholic Charismatic Covenant Communities.
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2008/october/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20081031_carismatici_en.html
This is a communique he sent to the Charismatic Renewal in 2008.
VATICAN CITY, MAY 4, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI is encouraging and praising the work of the Charismatic Renewal in its commitment to promote communion.
The Pope affirmed this in a letter sent through his secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, to the members of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal (Rinnovamento nello Spirito). The movement members are gathered near Rimini, Italy, for their 31st meeting. The annual celebration began Thursday and is focusing on the theme “Regenerated by the Word of God” (1 Peter 1:23).
More than 20,000 people are participating in the meeting. In Italy alone, the Charismatic Renewal has more than 200,000 members, among 1,900 groups and communities.
The papal letter stated that “His Holiness praises and encourages the commitment with which the Charismatic Renewal makes its own and carries forward the effort to promote communion and collaboration among the diverse realities that the same Spirit has brought about in the Church.”
The letter emphasized that the Holy Father “always follows the journey of the ecclesial movements with special pastoral solicitude” and that he exhorts the members of the Charismatic Renewal always to “unite with prayer their effective attention to the world’s needs and the good of men.”
I wrote to the priest who gave the sermon and pointed out to him that he said exactly what abusive priests say: “Everyone does this. It’s your fault. I need therapy and support (or, poor me, I have xyz). You need to forgive me.
What was really telling was that the homilist said that everyone in a family supports a family member who has gone astray, and we should do the same in the Church. .. Obviously, for him, the child is not part of the Church family.
Some in the Curia undoubtedly had to be aware of the expansion of homosexuality by the 1950s and early 60s. Otherwise, why would John XXIII have issued the instruction on homosexuality? It was apparently too late even then to stop the onslaught of homosexuality in the Church.
As far as priest-performers go, maybe we should bring back the old Latin low Mass? The concept of a priest facing the people seems problematic to me. Too many people want a priest to be a good entertainer.
This man is out of control and he is miserable. No one in his right mind goes into a public place i.e. store with movie theater and takes his clothes off. He is crying for help. Maybe this arrest will get it for him. It seems as if the police have been monitoring this business, and probably, everyone who uses it is aware of that.
Praying for him is all any of us can do for him as we do not know him personally, and at least as far as I am concerned, do not have the professional skills to attempt to help him.
He has done nothing that we know of to a child. That would be evil.
He should be removed from public ministry. Perhaps that is what he really wants. I sure hope that he can get the help he needs and can learn to stay away from such evil and degrading places as pornography stores.
Actually what gives me hope about this man is that he does not have the discretion to cover up his condition. People who are discreet about their vices are the most dangerous.
Father Michael, I agree. “Put not your trust in the children of men.” I would not be surprised by anyone doing anything. The truth is that in this time sex has become physical self-gratification, and homosexual “sex” is more about the self than heterosexual sex (where you have to do something to eliminate the possibility of another person arriving!). Lust leads inevitably to violence, St. Thomas says. So it is not surprising that strong men who live in the body and for self become homosexual. Also, lustful sex is about owning the other for oneself. This desire to possess has a physical component, which reaches its acme in rape. I believe the transition in pornography is from “normal” porn to deviant sex to pedophilia….children are easily used and overpowered, and they better satisfy the desire to own the other person. Ultimately, I think we will see that all the labels are just gradated variants of a sort of pansexual lust.
Janice, I don’t disagree. It is not an either or. I was using rhetoric to make the point that he is doing evil, that he needs more than therapy and prayers, and that the behavior is not considered by the world to be crazy, only rude or gross. And therefore we should be not only sad, but outraged, that we should look for and demand penalty, not only support and therapy, from Church and justice system, and that we should see his condition as dangerous to others and his own salvation, regardless of his mental state (which can be caused by the vise of vice).
There is a website which occasionally puts up news of clerical sex abuse with the headline “Our sad times”. With that attitude, we will all sit around tsk tsking and praying, and our energies are focused on pity for the malefactors. It is natural, because we, the tsk tskers, are losing an icon and not even seeing the victim (who by now has grown up and become somewhat untidy).
Actually, a little known part of the La Salette prochecies include one about priests becoming corrupt.
Mary, I can resinate with your January 25th posting about the narcissism of psychologically unhealthy priests. They forget they are preaching to parishioners who come to church to worship God, not them. Their narcissism displayed through drama on the altar (overt gestures of religious piety, made up homilies presented as the truth [everyone except the priest himself knows they are made up stories to get attention.] When I notice a priest is pretending to be more reverent, more sensational, and very narcissistic a red flag goes up. I doubt if a narcissistic priest would be able to comfort a grieving parishioner or feel their pain.
There are many healthy and spiritually committed priests in the Archdiocese of Baltimore. They are psychologically sound and have a vocation to call others closer to God. They are real and do not need to pretend to be more than they are. These are the priests I trust, respect and pray for daily.
When I notice a priest is pretending to be more reverent, more sensational, and very narcissistic a red flag goes up. I doubt if a narcissistic priest would be able to comfort a grieving parishioner or feel their pain.
MPG, in the funeral Mass for my mother, I noticed that the celebrant sang the “Let us proclaim the mystery of faith” when he didn’t sing any other part of the Mass. This was the same priest who treated me in such a clinical, callous manner only hours later.
When I notice a priest is pretending to be more reverent, more sensational, and very narcissistic a red flag goes up. I doubt if a narcissistic priest would be able to comfort a grieving parishioner or feel their pain.
MPG, in the funeral Mass for my mother, I noticed that the celebrant sang the “Let us proclaim the mystery of faith” when he didn’t sing any other part of the Mass. This was the same priest who treated me in such a clinical, callous manner only hours later.
The poor sap who has his pants off in the porn store has problems nothing to do with sexual preference.
He may suffer from DCS. Disordered Celibate Syndrome resulting in a hole in his head.
AW
From what I remember, Pius X’s famous moto proprio advises against or forbids turning the Mass into a performance. The seems not be heeded by clergy or laity. At my old church for a while selected artists would perform with their instruments before and during Mass close to the altar. Does the Novus Ordo Mass even have rubrics in practice? Or is it anything goes?
The Alton Route, there are rubrics (they’ve just been tightened a little actually) but they are often ignored.
The Alton Route, there are rubrics (they’ve just been tightened a little actually) but they are often ignored.
As is Canon Law. As is previous teaching (see the current Pope’s activism against capital punishment, as well as his predecessor’s). As is the Catechism (ditto). As is any modicum of common sense.
Father Michael, under such circumstances, there’s no way I could worship as a Catholic any longer. Nor would I encourage my children (if I had any) to do so.
The so-called “rubrics” are part of the problem. Catholicism places way too much emphasis on form, and not enough on substance. Who cares whether the priest is facing the people or not? What people want is the message of the Gospel delivered by an honorable, Godly person. That is what is lacking in the Catholic Church.
Besides, if facing people is so bad and narcissistic, why aren’t we hearing about all the evil child-molesting Protestant ministers? Probably because they are a lot more balanced than most Catholic priests.
Beth, go to “Religion and Child Abuse News” on the web. Especially interesting is the piece from 2010-12-28. If you punch in something like “Protestant ministers abuse kids” on your search engine, you’ll come up with lots of info.
Many Lutherans and Anglican ministers and priests have faced the altar while celebrating the Lord’s Supper so it’s not a Catholic vs. Protestant issue. The people may very well not care if the celebrant faces them or not, it’s the effect that facing the congregation can have on the celebrant that’s of interest and concern. Even the most Godly can be tempted by egoism, it’s called “original sin” or “the fallen nature” or the “old man”, depending on your tradition and theological preference. It all comes out meaning the same thing in the end; the servant can become too focused on him/herself and forget the one they serve. Certain customs and practices help or hinder.
What people want is the message of the Gospel delivered by an honorable, Godly person. That is what is lacking in the Catholic Church.
Well said, Beth. Sad, but true.
…why aren’t we hearing about all the evil child-molesting Protestant ministers? Probably because they are a lot more balanced than most Catholic priests.
Beth, I suggest you take a look at this site:
http://stopbaptistpredators.org/index.htm
The Anglican and Orthodox churches also have had problems with clerical sex-abuse.
St. Paul prophesied that in the “last days” (which, theologically, began at Pentecost), many people would have the facade of religion yet deny its power. He also said that a “great apostasy” would take place. That apostasy wouldn’t be exclusively theological. It could also be moral.
I am aware that there is abuse in every denomination. The difference is the degree of coverup in the Catholic Church. In most Protestant faiths it is easier to get rid of an erring minister. When something egregious comes to light, the members are at liberty to take action.
It has been my experience that the Catholic priesthood seems to attract a high number of socially awkward men, due in my opinion to the celibacy requirement. Most ( not all) normal men are not willing to give up marriage and family.
Sorry if this sounds harsh, but I am speaking from many years of being in the Catholic faith , and later in the Protestant.
In Protestant Churches, as in Catholic, the evil is the fact that abusers are left free to abuse again. This is so because they are not reported to authorities. With “passing the trash”, as in public school systems, or with “getting rid of an erring minister” by congregations in Protestant denominations, the abuser is still free to abuse more. The “coverup” in the Catholic Church simply means – perhaps, not always – that more people at more levels know about the abuse and don’t do the right thing about it, for whatever self-serving reasons, than is the case with other religions and institutions. The Church’s deep pockets and moral teaching are what have made her a more attractive target than other churches and institutions.
The Church’s deep pockets and moral teaching are what have made her a more attractive target than other churches and institutions.
Mary, I disagree with your assertion about “moral teaching.” If that teaching is so “moral,” especially concerning sexuality, then why don’t the bishops follow it or promote it? Why do bishops who oversee seminaries allow morally compromised candidates not only to study for the priesthood but also to be ordained? Of course, this isn’t just a Catholic problem. But the hypocrisy w/in Catholicism seems far more entrenched and rationalized than in other Christiann denominations.
I would really like to see some reliable statistics on abuse in the mainline denominations, broken down by type of abuse (adults, minors, physical, financial etc.) There is no way we can know how many people do not report abuse or how many accounts may be fictitious.
I have known two cases of ministers being fired by Sessions for not doing their jobs properly. Getting another job was very difficult for them. The last I heard one of them was still unemployed and living on his wife’s salary. So they were not exactly free to go to another church and keep on doing the same things. The last I heard of the female minister who was disciplined for sexual misconduct with an adult was that she had returned to her hometown to care for an elderly parent, so she is not back in ministry yet and will have this blot on her record permanently. No church organization in its right mind would hire someone who would make it risk a lawsuit.
The RC Church has severe problems with corruption in almost every way imaginable. Homosexuality is the largest source of sexual corruption in the Church. The Church can’t speak on moral issues because its own leaders are either compromised or don’t believe in the teachings of the Church (or both). I’ve been making my way slowly through Randy Enge’s The McHugh Chronicles, which is about how the bishops’ conference kept sabotaging the pro-life movement in the US. I read somewhere else about how the Canadian bishops were in favor of legalizing abortion in Canada in the 60s. With friends like the Catholic Church, who needs enemies? I’m a lifelong Catholic but if I were to get involved in the pro-life movement, I’d keep the Church as far away as possible.