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I am no longer actively publishing here, but IVE Info is still active. If you need anything, you can contact them at iveinfoblog@gmail.com.

In the meantime, here is an overview of this site:

My story

The abuses: part 1, part 2, part 3

The spiritual side of things

Links

FAQ

IVE Press’ “Give Me Your Heart”: A Close Reading: part 1, part 2, part 3

Advice, resources, similarities, and dealing with triggers.

"Vocation Talk": part 1, part 2, part 3 // Original SSVM Discernment Site

Pope Francis and the IVE; quote 1, quote 2

Letter from a seminarian

Fr. Dwight Longenecker’s 4 signs of cultlike behavior in Catholicism

IVE Info on 20 signs of problems in a new religious community, and my additional thoughts

Early history of the IVE

Aspirancy

Demographic Issue

Spiritual Exercises

All posts on this blog

Site Overview

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Original SSVM Discernment Site

About a week ago, it came to my attention that the Servants had deleted their discernment pages from their website. It seems that after my repeated criticism of their problematic advice (1, 2, 3), they gave up altogether and replaced that section of their website with a new catch-all page that eliminates all of what I have discussed here.

I believe this problematic advice is something people need to know about, so I am publishing the screen captures and text I have of their original discernment site, accurate as of October 17, 2013. I have posted the pages individually as private pages so as not to clog this website with duplicates.

All pages include the screen capture of the original followed by the copied text from the original sites so as to make them easier to read.

"Characteristics of a Vocation"

"What a religious vocation is not..."

"Temptations"

"Doubts"

"Characteristics of a True Response"

"Religious Vocations: A Call From God"

"Spiritual Reading"

"Discernment"

"FAQ"

"Perseverance"

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We caution anyone attending the Spiritual Exercises Retreats put on by the Institute of the Incarnate Word (IVE) and using them as a means of discernment.

Above, a woman who went on the IVE Spiritual Exercises writes in to IVE Info to describe her experience on the retreat. I had the same experience of pressure and poorly informed Ignatian spirituality as well, and I encourage anyone thinking of going on the Exercises to read it.

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Aspirancy

Summary: The Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará run what they call "aspirancies," which are full-time, live-in houses of formation for girls as young as 14. These aspirancies, which are unique to the SSVM and are not a part of Catholic tradition or practice, are a dysfunctional environment that does not allow for discernment for adults, let alone minors. On top of all that, the aspirancy has been run for the past two years by temporarily professed sisters whose own formation is not yet complete -- people who should by no means be in charge of forming others.

Recently I noticed that the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará main website was updated to include the aspirancy in the United States. One of the reasons I had not made a post about the aspirancy here is that the families I know who send their daughters there talk about it as a convent school, and it was discussed very informally, not being posted on the Servants’ provincial website. (Although there was an announcement when it began.) However, with this official acknowledgment of the aspirancy here, the IVE have proven themselves to be dishonest with disclosing their actual behavior yet again, and I wanted to make a post explaining what the aspirancy is and why the way the Servants have instituted this one is such a huge problem.

First of all, let’s define what an aspirancy is for those of you for whom that might be a new idea. After all, canon law does not cover the idea of the aspirancy in religious life, and certainly not the way the Servants use it -- so it's very unorthodox in modern religious life, to the point where I can't even find other aspirancies of its kind outside the order. In any case, here's what it is: an “aspirant” is a general word for a person looking into the religious life and discerning with a particular order; it is also the term used for the time before the person enters the order as a postulant and then novice. That is the conventional purpose of the aspirancy in religious life, and while each order has its own age limits and requirements, it is generally accepted to be open to those above the age of 18 (or at least, high school graduates). Aspirancy is different in each order or monastery, but it is always the adult candidate coming forward to think about religious life, perhaps living in the convent for a while, before making a decision. It is not considered a stage of formation, but rather a stage of inquiry, after which religious life may begin, and it is restricted to adults.

In times past, however, the aspirancy did not have an age limit, just as the religious life did not, and women of all ages – even as young as children – were permitted to be aspirants. The Church in her wisdom has since abandoned this practice and restricted the religious life to those spiritually mature enough and legally of age to discern and determine their vocations in this way.

That is an aspirancy in general,  but the Servants’ aspirancy in Avondale, PA, now entering into its third year, is not at all in conformity with the practice of the Church. This is obvious from the way they have hidden it from the public eye – it may be listed on the Servidoras’ main website now, but it was not listed for the past few years, and in fact, it is still listed nowhere on the provincial US SSVM website. But a simple examination of the facts is enough to tell us that without their covering it up anyway.

First of all, although it is talked about as a school, it is officially listed as a house of formation on servidoras.org. In fact, the aspirancies are all listed as houses of formation: see Brazil, Egypt, Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, and Ukraine (an exception being Jordan, which seems to just be an omission). The US is now the only “Western” (i.e. “First World,” Europe/North America) country with an aspirancy, which may be why it is not listed on the provincial website – culturally, I don’t think it would be at all acceptable here. If the Servants believe otherwise, why are they hiding it? Why is there no information publicly available about it, except from word-of-mouth forum postings and mentions on personal blogs (no link there in order to respect the privacy of the family)?

We are talking about high school-aged girls here, recruited for the aspirancy in their middle school years. I know because I was around when the aspirancy started, and I specifically remember being at the IVE Youth Festival the year it began; one of the girls I was with was recruited there and has been in the aspirancy for three years, and while they invited me to join the aspirancy as well, I was less desirable (as an older candidate – in my late teens at an established Catholic high school rather than an eighth grader not yet enrolled anywhere). These are young girls, recruited from ages 11-13 for an aspirancy that enrolls girls ages 14-18. That means that the IVE and SSVM are going to entirely form these girls’ spiritual experience – as aspirants toward religious life, keep in mind, rather than as students.

And to clarify, this is neither a school with a convent attached -- which is a normal Catholic educational practice -- nor a convent school or boarding school-type situation. The girls there take high school classes online, in combination with some homeschooling by a sister. The sister in charge of the aspirancy, Sr. Ephesus, only professed final vows this month. Normally formators have had years of experience in religious life before running houses of formation, but then, the SSVM don't even have that standard for vocation directors and superiors elsewhere. At least having a perpetually professed sister is an improvement on the situation elsewhere, where sisters who aren't even perpetually professed yet are formators. And, of course, that was the case for the past two years at the aspirancy before it was rectified this month.

Let’s be clear: it is spiritually, psychologically, and academically abusive of these girls to put them in religious life as children, period. And it breaks my heart that families are being manipulated by the Servants to accept this as the prudent tradition of the Church when in fact it is entirely of their own making.

As this site and IVE Info testify, the Religious Family of the Institute of the Incarnate Word is an entirely dysfunctional environment. It’s hard enough putting adults through that, but allowing children to be guided by these ill-prepared formators when there are perfectly healthy options like Catholic schools, homeschooling, or parish programs of religious education available is a crime against them. Fundamentally, whether they stay or go, these girls will grow to conflate the Institute of the Incarnate Word and the Servants with the Catholic Church as a whole, and the IVE/SSVM mindset will be the only one with which they are endowed. It is not fair to young Catholics to give them that model of how their faith is supposed to work.

The only mention of the aspirancy on the IVE website is here, as a side note in an event recap (just how seriously do they take this ministry?):

In addition, the sisters and aspirants of the SSVM Blessed Marie Catherine of St. Augustine community in Avondale, PA attended the investiture. The Aspirancy was founded in early 2011 for young women in high school who would like to discern the religious life while completing their high school education and living with sisters from the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará. (To learn more, contact the Aspirancy here.)

Living in a convent as a high school student is not a school. It’s religious life, and with the IVE? It’s regulation of their environment. It is listed elsewhere as a stage in religious life, after all – but when the order forms their only religious instruction, how are they supposed to attain the “responsibility and freedom” to make the kind of decision required to enter religious life?

Note that on the male side, there is the IVE minor seminary which begins just as young. However, while the SSVM have essentially covered up the aspirancy, the website for the minor seminary shows that the IVE have obviously entirely owned and publicized their efforts to form and recruit the young men who attend the high school seminary.

In short: the IVE and SSVM have set up institutions where religious life essentially begins at the age of 14. That is far too early to allow young Catholics proper discernment and formation, besides which it intrudes on the sanctity of the domestic Church – the family, of whom the parents are the head – by replacing parental authority with their own. Young people deserve better.

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The Demographic Issue

Where are the older sisters?

One of the biggest questions and holes in the SSVM narrative is the demographic issue. The Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará were founded in 1988, so it has been 25 years. Even if all of the original sisters were 18 (which they definitely were not, but even if they were) – there should at least be some Argentine sisters over the age of 40, and certainly more sisters in their 40s in general. But a quick survey of the current superiors, whether you know them in person as I do or just glance at any of the Servants’ PR stuff online, will show that most of the superiors are young (late 20s and 30s), and most have only just professed perpetual vows. In fact, the superiors of some houses, and even past US provincial vocations directors, were only under temporary vows when appointed to their positions. 

These demographic issues raise the following questions: If they have over 1,000 sisters, as they claim, then why have most superiors only just professed perpetual vows? Where are the Argentine sisters in their forties? Where is the older generation of sisters that should be leading the order now? Why are all the superiors so young? It’s an open question, certainly, but a high attrition rate would explain it.

But this is not just about local superiors. One rare exception to the rule here is the general superior of the order, who is 43 years old – but her background, rather than dispelling concerns, raises even more questions.

What is the story with the general superior?

This information on Mother Anima (edit: the original link was taken down after this post went up, but has since been reinstated; the cached version has been linked in case they decide to take it back down again), the current general superior of the Servants, shows that she was born in 1970 in Holland and moved to Argentina at age 25 to enter religious life with the IVE. That would have been 1995 or 1996, depending on her birthday and when she joined. She then became general superior in 1998.

Read carefully, that information reveals that she was 28 when she became the general superior, and had only been in religious life for three years! She didn’t meet the bare-minimum novitiate of one year and temporary vows period of 3 years and 9 months required by canon law, and certainly not the IVE constitutions’ requirement of 5 years of temporary vows, let alone any sort of postulancy requirement in addition to all that. In short, a sister should take at least 6 to 7 years to become perpetually professed, so the idea that the Servants’ general superior was only in religious life for three years before being appointed to that position is sketchy to say the least and certainly quite alarming. Taking perpetual vows in only three years would have been wholly unorthodox of itself, let alone becoming the general superior of an order. But the IVE have violated canon law and their own constitutions before – and in fact they make a bit of a habit of it.

Why was Mother Anima appointed general superior just after profession? Was there nobody else? Did she arrive on the scene before or after the order’s founding, if her trajectory was that quick? Perhaps Jack Tollers’ report that the order was really founded by Fr. Nadal (with whom most sisters left) and not Fr. Buela has something to it.

Why do young women join, and leave when they are older?

It’s easy to see why young women would want to join the order – a youthful zeal to serve God and a genuine desire to espouse Christ in an order that wears habits, proclaims faithfulness to the Church, and seems to be full of similarly young disciples of Christ. Youth attracts youth – but how is that any different from the blind leading the blind? Religious orders, like families, need both the wisdom of the elders and the energy of the youth to work.

As for why they leave, that is a question that would have to be asked of every individual sister and it is not for anyone to speculate. The Institute of the Incarnate Word is not what it appears to be; it obeys neither Church authority nor its own constitutions, and it does not live with the joy, charity, and honesty it claims. These things may contribute toward the hurt people feel that causes them to leave, but ultimately this is not the place to make sweeping generalizations.

What we do know is that the Servants have a serious hole in their narrative, and that story is told by plain demographics. The lack of older sisters, the quick rise to power for barely professed sisters, and the youth of superiors without much experience of religious life all point to high attrition. To call that trend “growing pains” for a young order is simply naïveté; other young orders like the Missionaries of Charity, the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist, and the Religious Sisters of Mercy, Alma are all examples of faithful and recently founded religious orders that do not have this demographic problem. They may all have a relatively small number of members compared to older orders, but their membership is evenly spread across age demographics and they do not appoint new members to positions of power and formation, unlike the Servants. This particular characteristic of youth is not to be conflated with the virtues of zeal and joy, which are ageless – rather, it is a sign of the inability to retain members, and a symptom of the greater problems that afflict the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará and the IVE as a whole.

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Part of teaching also includes this: One cannot replace another person's decision. the priest who adopts an attitude of only being a boss, like in fundamentalist groups, nullifies and emasculates those who are searching for God. The priest, in his role as teacher, instructs, proposes the truth as it is revealed, and accompanies. The teacher who nullifies the decision-making for his disciple is not a good priest; he is a good dictator, denying others their religious personalities.

Then-Cardinal Bergoglio, now Pope Francis, in the book On Heaven and Earth, which I have quoted before in light of the pope’s history with the IVE and SSVM. Speaking here about “spiritual dictation,” the Pope points out that warping the vow of obedience and abusing the power of spiritual authority is damaging in formation. I’ve talked about this many times before in the IVE/SSVM context; see especially the ‘vocation talk’ posts, ‘Give Me Your Heart’ posts, and the posts related to obedience.

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A well-informed Layman's view of Fr Carlos Buela and the Institute of the Incarnate Word (IVE).

This post at IVE Info details some of the Institute of the Incarnate Word's early history, which has not really been made available online and certainly not in English. I wanted to share it all with you, even though there is little information on the genesis of the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará, because the character of the order's beginnings explains a lot of their behavior now. 

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20 Signs of Trouble in New Religious Groups and Cults applied to the Institute of the Incarnate Word (IVE)

The IVE Info blog's latest post is excellent, and a great deal of it applies to the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará as well. The only things I have to qualify:

The Servidoras tend to be somewhat more involved than the IVE priests in the local church. This is due more to the nature of their respective ministries, however; ordained missionaries will naturally set up their own parishes or fill gaps in the diocese rather than coexist alongside diocesan priests, while religious sisters tend to be at the mercy of the bishop's needs in the diocese.

The Servidoras do certainly give "celebrity status" to Buela (as well as to McCarrick, in my opinion, and any clergyman they can attach themselves to), and it goes beyond hospitality. The female superiors do not have these same privileges, though they certainly have many. They take great advantage of the vow of obedience but they don't have anything like the cult of personality surrounding the men.

The Marian character of the IVE is said to be superficial in this post, and I would agree that the same is true for the SSVM -- but a little less so. The sisters all being named for Mary and their constant references to Our Lady make her much more present in the sisters' lives than in the priests' and brothers', but again, it's still a very superficial vow. Fourth vows are supposed to be used to dedicate an order to a particular charism, like a fourth vow of "joyful service to the poorest of the poor" (Missionaries of Charity) or a fourth vow of hospitality (Little Sisters of the Poor), for example. "Slavery to Mary" is an intangible and therefore meaningless vow; the point of poverty, chastity, and obedience is that they are evangelical counsels, i.e. concrete practices rooted in the life of Christ that are applied to a vowed religious in order to dedicate oneself to the service of others. They are supposed to be physical, tangible things; a vowed religious does not just vow her "spirit" but her whole being.

Lastly, the "no background checks" rule does not necessarily apply to the SSVM. Some sisters have to go through psychological exams, but nothing is consistent; either way it's generally a light process (but it also depends on the given person).

Please do go read the whole post at IVE Info; it's really important and thorough.

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Dishonesty

Many parishes do a Christmas fundraiser, whether those “trees” we’ve all seen in vestibules of presents for underprivileged children or gift bags for CCD kids or what have you. The following anecdote comes from a former sister who participated in such a fundraiser at an IVE parish. The sister’s name has been changed for her privacy; we are just going to call her “Mary.”

At Mary’s parish, parents who registered and paid for religion class would also sign up their kids to receive Christmas presents from a charity group. They would write down the child’s name, age, clothing size, and a little wishlist, and a month before Christmas, bags of gifts for the children prepared by the charity group would arrive at the church. Some would have twenty gifts! It was a very generous ministry to be sure, whoever ran this outside charity group.

Well, Mary and her fellow sisters, as well as one lay person, were instructed to go through the bags before giving them to the children. They had to take out any candy to store away and use for events throughout the year; they had to remove any gift cards and give them to the parish’s IVE pastor -- who knew exactly where they came from -- to use for parish events; and they had to make sure each bag contained no more than seven gifts. Worst of all, the superior had filled out forms for children who did not exist, just making up names so that they could get more stuff out of the charity group. All of the extra presents that did not go in the 7-item-per-bag groups for each child went into a big community storage that the superior used for various purposes: to sell at yard sales, to give as gifts during events, or to give as gifts to family members of the sisters for Christmas. Mary was completely scandalized by it all, mentioned it to her spiritual director (an IVE priest), talked to the superior about it, and was told that this was simply how things were done.

Apparently, taking advantage of others’ generosity and stealing from children is “how things were done.” Wanting to care for your fellow sisters is fine; shady and dishonest practices like this are not.

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Abuse of the Vow of Obedience

I’ve mentioned the way sisters in the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará are trained to be divided against one another in formation before (here and here), and a story I was told by a former sister recently spoke to this in more detail. She mentioned that as a postulant, she was asked at weekly meetings with the novice mistress to discuss the activities of another postulant. The novice mistress would ask about the other postulant’s behavior, what she was doing, how she was acting, and other information as she saw fit. The sister felt uncomfortable spying on her fellow postulant and mentioned every single week that she did not want to talk about her, but she was told that she had no choice. Her spiritual director, who at that point was a diocesan priest (sisters are assigned priests of the Institute of the Incarnate Word eventually but early on in their postulancy may still have a diocesan spiritual director unaffiliated with the order), informed her that she was not at all required to spy on anyone, like any responsible superior would say. Of course, when the sister went back to the novice mistress and repeated what her spiritual director had said, she was told again that she had no choice and was required to report on her fellow postulant’s activities.

Of course, this is not acceptable behavior at all. Requiring sisters to spy on each other, overruling someone’s spiritual director, and pressuring someone into activities that make them uncomfortable are abuses of the vow of obedience. 

But these aren’t just small issues in some novitiate somewhere, confined to one convent and a handful of abusive individuals. No, the novice mistress in this story is now the provincial superior. These issues are compounded into a problematic power structure. They aren’t isolated; they’re systematic.

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“Yes, some small restorationist factions have continued to multiply; I call them fundamentalists. As you said, before this heap of uncertainties they tell young people: “Do this, do that.” So a seventeen- or eighteen-year-old boy or girl gets excited and they push them forward with rigid directives. And to be honest, they mortgage their lives at thirty, they burst because they were not properly prepared to overcome the thousand and one crises in life, or the thousand and one shortcomings that everyone has, or the thousand and one wrongs that they are going to commit. They do not have the proper criteria to know and understand the mercy of God, for example. This type of rigid religiosity is disguised with doctrines that claim to give justifications, but in reality deprive people of their freedom and do not allow them to grow as persons. A large number end up living a double life.”

Pope Francis, ‘On Fundamentalists,’ in On Heaven and Earth by Skoka and Bergoglio, 2010.  "I’m pretty sure that this passage is referring to the number of new revivalist religious orders and groups of lay faithful which have begun in the 20th century. With this in mind, his description does seem to fit. Obviously Bergoglio was trying to avoid referring to any group in particular but the description seems very consistent with the criticisms which have been levelled at the new ‘conservative’ orders such as Opus Dei, Legionaries of Christ, IVE, Heralds of the Gospel, and other various new groups which have been at times accused of being cult-like for the level of control they exercise over their members and the limitations imposed on their members’ freedom.  "...I’m not going to get involved at all here in any sort of mud-slinging at those groups, but it does interest me that the pope has gone on record with this comment and given some thought to the psychological and emotional undercurrents of the situation. Someone once told me that  one of the biggest problems in the Church is the concept that holiness requires one to utterly submit their will to that of another; to allow oneself to be completely directed and controlled, without the freedom to question or refuse or disobey. In my opinion it does seem that this is a very real problem in the Church, particularly in the new forms of religious or consecrated life which offer young people a conservative alternative to the traditional orders which became quite liberal in the latter half of the 20th century. I find it encouraging to know that this issue is clear in the Holy Father’s mind - not only present clearly but with a good amount of insight too, it seems."  -tim-91

Edit from ssvmabuse: Agreed, and don't forget that the pope has acted on this before.

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(I'm reblogging this as a link and not as a photo because I know that seeing photos of the sisters can be really triggering for some of us, especially without warning. The photo in the link is of a Servidora's profession of first vows.)

I just wanted to state publicly on the blog that I am really disappointed with Imagine Sisters, a movement that has otherwise been doing amazing work in promoting a positive image of women religious (or at least CMSWR women religious). As they have announced on their site, they will be featuring the SSVM in their documentary, Light of Love -- one of only a few orders that will be highlighted -- and as this link shows, obviously, they are promoting them on their site as well. I have raised concerns publicly about the order's abusive practices, and I have privately raised these concerns with Imagine Sisters so that they have all this information and are perfectly aware of what they are doing in promoting the SSVM as an example of good, holy, healthy religious life for women. I explained my concerns via email to the laymen who run Imagine Sisters, and they informed me that they were not responsible for the groups that they were promoting, saying my concerns should be taken up elsewhere. (Of course, I have taken them up elsewhere; the point is, they didn't seem interested in vetting the orders they were promoting, and when I came to them with concrete concerns, they simply shrugged off any responsibility.)

We deserve better than this.

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The Institute of the Incarnate Word and the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará exhibit all of these signs.

1. The "too good to be true" public relations operation

The sisters are often called the "joyful sisters" -- don't get me wrong, joy is great, but perpetual smiles and no seeming hardships from the outside are red flags. No, really. And the IVE's various social media, websites, and publications speak for themselves.

2. Non-transparent leadership

A lot of the IVE's and Servidoras' governance happens in highly secretive chains of command. Sisters are treated as "cases" taken to the "higher-ups" rather than individual human beings to be engaged with.

3. Complete loyalty, with any dissent or difficulty dismissed as "sinful"

Any criticisms raised by members, or outsiders, are dismissed as temptation talk. IVE Info has blogged about this time and time again, and the hypocrisy of it.

4. A persecution complex

Again, IVE Info has this covered, but the IVE and Servidoras are always using military parlance and emphasizing the "warfare" aspect of Catholic life; they consider themselves at war with some outside force that is the enemy of the holy, righteous order itself. Many criticisms are dismissed as attacks by some sort of left-wing agenda on the order's "orthodoxy."

Fr Longenecker addresses all this really well. And I am in complete agreement with what he says about cults' origins. "The problem is that when a group is becoming cult-like it does so innocently. Nobody sets out to establish a cult. Instead, unconsciously certain individuals start to behave in this manner and they support one another."

So what to do about it? Fr Longenecker suggests several antidotes: the parish system (go to your local parish rather than engaging in church-hopping, which can tend toward hero worship); common sense; openness to criticism and dissent; and being able to confess and apologize. 

But his conclusion is the best part of all.

Finally, real religion is just that. It’s real. It’s humble. Remember the word “humility” comes from the word “humus” which means “earth”. Real religion is down to earth. It’s humble and oh yes, “Humus” is also the root for “humor”. Real religion always knows how to have a laugh. If a group or a person can’t laugh at themselves–be suspicious. If they take themselves or their movement or their spirituality with utmost seriousness–beware.

Fr Dwight Longenecker writes about four ways, behaviors, that identify cult like groups, even among Catholic groups. The implications are far reaching.

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I have updated the overview of this blog and wanted to repost it. I also wanted to take this opportunity to remind you all of my prayers for you, now and always, that you and all people discerning God's truth and His will for their lives will be in His embrace, and that we will all have the courage to seek the help and healing we need in one another and in Christ.

Please know, as always, that my ask box and email are open to you if you need to talk. I am here as a resource for this community of survivors & discerners with the Institute of the Incarnate Word and the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará, and I am completely at your service.

Always, Laura Monica

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Whilst the doctrine taught within the Institute is for most part orthodox please don't be fooled by this because the truth without love is meaningless, and there is very little charity or love evident within the Institute.

A former IVE seminarian's letter over at IVE Info. I really encourage anyone discerning to read it, as it outlines a lot of the issues with abusive religious orders through the lens of a personal experience. It is important to keep in mind what is written over at IVE Info's "why" section: there's a difference between being materially, legalistically orthodox, like the IVE, and formally orthodox -- i.e. really internalizing and living orthodoxy. When orthodoxy is used for self-promotion rather than allowing it to truly influence your life, it is not orthodoxy at all.

And let me go back and emphasize: The truth without love is meaningless.

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As you all know, Jorge Mario Cardinal Bergoglio of Argentina has become Pope Francis. Given the now Pope's history in Buenos Aires, of which he is a native and was the archbishop, naturally I have been wondering about his relationship to the Institute of the Incarnate Word and the Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará. As linked above over at the IVE Info blog, there is much to tell.

Research is ongoing, but here's what you need to know:

During the first investigation into the IVE, then-Cardinal Bergoglio was the Primate of Argentina. (x)

Then-Cardinal Bergoglio, alongside the other Argentine bishops, shut down the IVE in Argentina. Ordinations stopped, the seminary in San Rafael was shut down, and Fr. Buela and the other IVE priests were restricted. (x)

The IVE's main line of defense is "we're persecuted because we're conservative," as articulated by IVE seminarian Daniel Vitz here, but the main official who shut down the IVE in Argentina has just been elected Pope, whom it is difficult to call a heterodox left-winger.

If they were shut down in Argentina, how did the IVE and Fr. Buela manage to continue on? You can credit Cardinal Sodano (yes, the same man who was bribed by and supported sexual abuser Marcial Maciel), and his close cooperators Ambassador Casselli and Bishop Aguer, for that. More at IVE Info blog.

Bergoglio met privately with Pope Benedict to discuss these moves of support for the IVE by Sodano & co, which were basically a slap in the face to Argentine episcopal authority.

What's really important here is that the current Pope knows about the IVE and the SSVM. He's known for a while, but he didn't just sit there and do nothing. He was a good shepherd in Argentina. Pray that he will continue to be one for the whole of the Church.

Both my friends at the IVE info blog and I are keeping tabs on this, so stay tuned. And as always, you and all those affected by abuse are in my prayers as in Christ's arms.

Edit: Since this post went a bit viral in IVE circles, the IVE of Greenland have set up this blog extolling John Paul II's "special affection for our little Institute." It is convenient and unsurprising that the IVE should divert their attention to the past, when someone who didn't know the full extent of their abuse was at the top of the hierarchy. There's nothing wrong with revering John Paul II, as I do; but there's a lot wrong with this timing and this emphasis. It's so telling.

Not to mention, "Why this blog?" Their site seems a little too similar to IVE Info and this one. Keep an open and prudent heart as you discern, and be wary of those who would have you close your eyes.

[ssvmabuse]

Hi everyone, I've been getting a lot of page views recently. I don't know where they're coming from, but that's not the important thing. The important thing is that you know that if you need help, I am here to talk, to help you sort through this, to pray for you, to explain things, whatever you need to grow closer to God and to heal from your experience with the Institute of the Incarnate Word/Servants of the Lord and the Virgin of Matará.

You can click on 'talk' above to send me a message, or you can email me at ssvmabuse@gmail.com. Know that God loves you, that my prayers are with you, and that a whole community of survivors is here to help if you need us to. I hope sincerely that you're alright. 

Edit: Please note that I do not accept anonymous messages. The Tumblr inbox is open to those who have a Tumblr account, and the email is open to everyone. This is to protect your privacy and mine. I will never ask personal information or names; I simply ask that correspondence be private, between individuals, and not accidentally publishable as Tumblr asks can be! I hope you understand. Thank you.