Amid calls from California activists to drop vandalism charges against five assailants who destroyed a statue of St. Junipero Serra last year, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco warned that doing so would set a dangerous precedent.
“If a crime caught on videotape and witnessed by the police were not to have been prosecuted, it would have sent a profoundly disturbing message to the hundreds of thousands of people of faith in Marin County: churches, synagogues, mosques and temples are at the mercy of small mobs,” Cordileone said in a Feb. 19 statement.
“Even more, this would set an extremely troubling precedent in that no one could be secure that those who perpetrate crimes against them will be prosecuted for their wrongdoing.”
On Oct. 12, 2020 — Indigenous Peoples Day in California — a group of activists defaced and pulled down a statue of St. Junipero Serra on private property at Mission San Rafael Arcángel in San Rafael, about 20 miles north of San Francisco.
Of the group that destroyed the statue, police arrested and recommended charges for six individuals. District Attorney Lori Frugoli subsequently charged five of those people, all women, with felony vandalism.
Cordileone performed an exorcism at the site of the statue Oct. 17, calling the statue’s destruction an act of blasphemy.
Cordileone had in late October 2020 asked the Marin County district attorney to prosecute those arrested after the riot at the mission church to the “full extent of the law.” He also seconded the San Rafael Police Department’s request that six individuals be charged with vandalism in a house of worship, a hate crime.
“If the perpetrators of this crime are not brought to justice, small mobs will be able to decide what religious symbols all people of faith may display on their own property to further their faith, and they will continue to inflict considerable spiritual suffering on ordinary Catholic people who would see our sacred spaces as unprotected by law,” he wrote to Frugoli at the time.
Full story at Catholic News Agency.
Damage of religious property, of any religion, is not permissible. I still wonder if an inexpensive security camera system might have been an effective front-end deterent.
Thanks to the Archbishop
These acts of vandalism must be stopped now.
It is senseless, stupid, idiotic, childish foolishness.
Catholics also brought to this country,
schools, education, medicine, science, agriculture, hospitals, the beginning of the modern world.
No doubt these “educated” vandals drive home at night, look at TV news,
read books, take their medicines, look at their computers, and write emails.
Why don’t they think about this, before they commit their stupid actions.
Many people today, need to be taught their morals and their manners, and basic decency, discipline, and respect! Many are too smart-alecky, extremely egoistic “know-it-all” radicals, “too big for their britches.” They all need a good lesson. Vandalism of a church or of sacred sites and holy statues and other religious items, is a horrible act of blasphemy. Glad that Abp. Cordileone strongly demanded charges to be brought against these lawless vandals. I am also happy that he performed an exorcism.
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of exorcism.
Who wrote the item? October 12 is Columbus Day. What purple haired kids in the street might want to call it is irrelevant as is what Berkeley or the State of California might want to call it.
We live in California. What the state calls it is what it is inside the borders.
We also live in the United States and October 12 is Columbus Day.
Historically, celebrations of Columbus were protested by anti-Catholic groups like the KKK.
Politics and protest make strange bedfellows.
Look at the photo. That’s who Police Chief Diana Bishop and her Meter Maids (and Cordileone) were loath to confront. Talk about your “dangerous precedents,” your “disturbing messages.”
Gee, and I thought everyone loved a catfight.
“Land back now”? None of these vandals look indigenous to any place but the original home of the Vandals. (Look it up.)
It’s bad enough that Cordileone speaks of Serra in social justice terms, but he and Catholic News Agency (original article) perpetuate the lie of “horrific abuse” and “terrible human rights abuses . . . by Spanish conquerors . . . and genocide . . . by the Anglo Americans who governed California.”