In 2004, Rodé became prefect of the congregation that governs religious orders. His predecessor, Cardinal Eduardo Martínez Somalo, took a $90,000 gift from Maciel, according to the priest who carried the envelope. Martínez Somalo refused interview requests.Rodé said he took no cash gifts from the Legion."I esteem the charism of the Legionaries," Rodé told NCR in a Nov. 29 interview at his apartment at the Vatican. He saw young men of rock-solid orthodoxy, their numbers rising in Latin America as vocations sank in Europe and North America. Rodé gave celebratory speeches for the Legion in Brazil and Chile and praised the founder after Maciel's ouster.Asked whether that was a mistake, he couched his answer in the context of papal loyalty. "It is difficult to say it was a mistake by the pope," he said, referencing John Paul's praise of Maciel long after the 1998 case filed in the doctrinal congregation. "I don't know. I wasn't there" to know what John Paul knew, or would not consider, about Maciel.Rodé defends the Legionaries as a phenomenon apart from Maciel, a position Benedict took in the Vatican takeover to reform the order.A former Legion priest, speaking on background, said he met with Rodé after Maciel's death and the cardinal told him of a VHS he had seen when Maciel was superior general of Maciel and his young daughter.Asked about this, Rodé gave a somber nod, saying it was "late 2004, or early 2005." The Legionary who showed it wanted him to have the information before the order's election for superior general, the position Maciel held for decades. Rodé says he persuaded the 84-year-old Maciel, by then under investigation, to step down. Maciel was re-elected and then retired.What did Rodé do about the videotape showing Maciel's daughter?"I told Msgr. Scicluna all about the problem," the cardinal said.Scicluna reported directly to Ratzinger.As the prefect over religious orders, why did Rodé not punish Maciel?"It was not for me to pronounce the penalty," he said. "But he was, in the end, corrected" -- by Benedict's 2006 Vatican order sending Maciel to a "life of prayer and penitence."Did the cardinal confront Maciel about his child?"It was not my obligation."Why not?"I was not his confessor." Rodé paused. "It was my obligation as prefect for religious to get him to step down, and I did."
One must look at the date here [11Dec08], as well as the content, since Cardinal Rode was an enthusiastic supporter of the group. He spoke glowingly of both Maciel and the Movement after 2006, giving lectures at Legion venues in Rome and Atlanta. His words are curious, given his understanding of foundersand their relationship to their foundations:
“Religious life, being a gift of the Holy Spirit for each religious and the Church, depends especially on fidelity to its origins, fidelity to the founder and to the particular charism. Fidelity to this charism is essential, because God blesses faithfulness, while he ‘resists the proud.’ The complete rupture of some with the past, therefore, goes against the nature of a religious congregation and in essence, leads to the rejection of God,” he said.
In light of that teaching, consider these glowing remarks he made at the 2007 YFE, knowing already that the Founder of LC/RC was not what he appeared to be:
Your charism is a gift that the Holy Spirit has delivered personally to each one of you in order to serve the Church. This gift is part of God's will with the intention of making each of you a source of radiating it thereby. So the charism is both a gift and a responsibility.I know how your founder insists that outside the Church, Regnum Christi is meaningless, and how you, as faithful children, take care and nourish the relationship to the Pope and the Church. It identifies you like your DNA. Where there is a member of Regnum Christi, there is profound communion with the Vicar of Christ and with the Mystical Body of Christ. Communion with the Pope and with the Church is your guarantee of apostolic fruitfulness.It is true, as I have repeated many times your founder, that to follow Christ is to deny yourself. In this effort, keep in mind the leitmotif of Pope Benedict XVI's speech of the beginning of his pontificate: "Be not afraid: Christ takes nothing and gives everything."Do not be afraid to grow, but rather fear not to grow. How much good will accrue if you grow! And, how well, sadly, it will cease if you do not grow! The Church needs you, and you need to become even stronger and larger. To carry out your apostolic charism, you are to grow.
If there are any records that you must carry from this meeting, it is this: Grow. Grow in depth and grow in extension. Growing up means growing in depth knowledge and love of Christ, intellectually and apostolically, and assimilate that knowledge into your charism. Growing by extension means to grow numerically, so that through Regnum Christi there will be more apostles, more work, more initiatives to serve the Church and souls. This is what the Church needs and what the world needs. And I would say, I need every one of you if you are not going to defraud God's plans for your life.And also, to assimilate and penetrate the charism of your movement, apply what the Church tells her Religious: the Founder's interpretation is the interpretation of an authentic charism. So, read, meditate and assimilate the words of the one whom God chose to convey to this spirit, your Founder, Fr Maciel. It is the preferred means through which God imprints the charism of Regnum Christi in your consciousness, in your heart and in your actions.Dear friends, members of Regnum Christi, grow always in the love of Christ, the apostolic impetus in living charity, which is your charism. The Church needs these traits.
Stunning words, knowing that he knew by then that MM was a fraud, that Movements depended on the holiness of their Founders, and that the more he encouraged this group to grow (right out of MM's AFIRE manual) the larger the cancer at the heart of the Church--to which MM and Rode encouraged it to cleave.
There is also the problem that 3gf members of RC were living by statutes ostensiblyapproved by Rode's dicastery, but that were later admitted not to have actually been so approved.
The decree is signed by Archbishop Rodé and by Archbishop Piergiorgio Silvano Nesti, secretary of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life.
The decree continue: "Its specific charism is the same as that of the Legion of Christ and consists in knowing, living and preaching the commandment of love that Jesus Christ the Redeemer came to bring us by his incarnation. Well known, in fact, is the work carried out by the Legionaries of Christ and the members of the Regnum Christi apostolate movement in building the civilization of Christian justice and love."
"The founder of the Legion of Christ and of Regnum Christi presented to the Apostolic See the 'Statutes' of the Regnum Christi apostolate movement requesting their definitive approval. The Supreme Pontiff received this request paternally and with his supreme authority has approved them," it states.
Remember that for years previous to this event, the Movement stressed that everything had already been approved -- but ultimately this approval amounted to roughly 1/10th of the whole body of rules by which 3gf's (and 3gm's) had already been living.
I leave it to you to consider what this means. I find it disturbing and misleading--promoting a known fraud, encouraging his compromised creation to grow, encouraging the members to follow rules that were crafted by a liar; and then standing by as the Founder died--and was praised as a good and faithful servant. Why? Cui bono? And still it continues.
