(Not So) Masters of Deceit

A recent Pistrina Liturgica article (click here) caught Dannie wrongly attributing “Lurch” (aka, “Fr. McGuire”) as being the author of something written in a recent St. Hughes bulletin, when in fact it was a verbatim repetition of something actually written by someone else -- a priest named Fr. Simon Tugwell.  And in yet another article (click here), Pistrina found Dannie plagiarizing again – this time from a piece written by a man named Paul Anthony Jones.  Afterwards, Pistrina then gave Dannie a chance to mend his ways (and not plagiarize again), warning him not to plagiarize the following Sunday -- but Dannie didn’t heed the warning: that following Sunday, he passed off even more of Mr. Jones’ writing as his own. (Click here for that article.)

But that’s not the first time that Dannie has plagiarized – nor will it be the last.  For instance, here’s another example: in an article in September of 2016 (click here), we mentioned how Dannie quoted a passage from a Dr. Anthony Esolen (concerning the proper running of a school), following that with a statement giving the reader the impression that SGG’s school and Dr. Esolen’s representation of what a school should be were one and the same.  Nothing, of course, could be farther from the truth. 

The other false impression that Dannie’s readers probably got was that this “Dr. Esolen” was “traditional.”  He is not.  Actually, he is affiliated with Providence College, a Novus Ordo institution (which Dannie would otherwise be bad-mouthing).  But Dannie probably figured that none of his Gerties would check up on Dr. Esolen’s “credentials” or affiliation, and hence figured it was safe to “use” Dr. Esolen for his own purposes.

But plagiarizing is just one of the many ways that Dannie “practices to deceive.”  There are others, one of his “favorites” being name-dropping.  A few examples will illustrate:  Once, Dannie mentioned a priest coming to SGG for a “Solemn Mass with Fr. Cekada and myself” – insinuating that this had just happened.  He was, in fact, referring to an event that had taken place twenty-five years prior.  (See Dannie’s Name-Dropping Bird Droppings.)  Dannie wanted to give his readers the impression that he and this priest were “the best of buddies.”  The priest, at one time on friendly terms with Dannie, had long since broken with him -- and now loathes Dannie.¹ 

But perhaps Dannie’s most frequent use of name-dropping is that of invoking the name of Bernie Brueggemann.  (See Name Dropping’s Poster Child.)  Dannie always liked to use his name because Bernie -- at one time SGG’s main benefactor (before he left after the 2009 school scandals) -- is still remembered (and revered) by many at SGG, and hence of good “propaganda value" to Dannie.  Once, after engaging in a bit of “Bergoglio bashing,” Dannie added, “What would Bernie Brueggemann have to say about this?”  And on another occasion, Dannie stated, “In the last year of his life [our emphasis], Bernie more than once expressed his wish to be buried from St. Gertrude the Great. He was buried instead from Immaculate Conception, although he once so opposed this group’s scandalous inception in 1989, as to forbid discussion of the very subject in his home.” 

What Dannie conveniently failed to remember was that Bernie spent “the last year of his life” (and longer than that) NOT at SGG but at another church (St. Albert the Great); so, during that time, he couldn’t possibly have “expressed his wish to be buried from St. Gertrude the Great.” And another thing that Dannie failed to mention was that Bernie actually attended Immaculate Conception Church every First Friday for a good number of years before “the last year of his life”; and he did NOT, as Dannie put it, “forbid discussion of the very subject in his home.”  This was, plainly put, a BALD-FACED LIE.  When Bernie’s son heard what Dannie said, he was IRATE, and responded (in an e-mail) that it was “bulls**t.”  For Dirt-bag Dan to say what he did was not only despicable, but downright STUPID, for Bernie’s entire family could bear witness to it’s being utterly false.  However, that did not deter Dannie from making his false claim, because he probably figured that his gullible Gerties would believe it anyway.

Then, of course, another act of deception (and subterfuge) was Dannie’s abortive attempt to sabotage the ordination of a priest in Lawrence, Massachusetts (mentioned in our last article).  Dannie tried to deceive the people there into believing that the young man to be ordained was “unfit.”  (See Pistrina’s article, A Shut Soul’s Hypocrisy.)  This was not only an act of deception, but one of duplicity and mendacity as well.  And who could forget Dannie’s trying every year to convince everyone that SGG’s altar is “privileged” (because Dannie is a “bishop”).  As Pistrina correctly pointed out in its article, “Altar” Ego, only a lawfully appointed bishop (with a see) can claim a privileged altar – and Dannie doesn’t qualify on either count.

Yet another (embarrassingly stupid) attempt at deception by Dannie was this one, when Dannie wrote in his Bishop’s(?) ‘Corner of Jan. 3, 2016 that some of his affiliate clerics “had crosses* this Christmas”….  Fr. Mardones says Juarez and El Paso had the worst (and first!) snow in many years, shutting down the cities over the weekend.  Bishop Sanborn’s back grew worse after his Michigan trip for Bishop McKenna’s funeral, and he finally had to cancel his Christmas trip to England and the Continent.”  How sad to miss Mass for Christmas, or be laid up and out of action.”  Dannie was insinuating that Fr. Mardones missed Christmas because of the snow (and that Sanborn missed his trip because of back trouble).

The problem, however, with Dannie’s insinuation that Fr. Mardones missed Christmas Mass (because of the snow) is that the snow down in El Paso and Juarez didn’t even start until the afternoon of the day AFTER Christmas.  So, the snow couldn't possibly have caused Fr. Mardones "to miss Mass for Christmas" – making a liar out of Dannie once again.  (Click here for the El Paso newspaper’s account of the snow-storm).²

There are actually many more examples of Dannie’s deception that we could catalog here – but that would make for a prohibitively long article.  However, two more recent examples bear mentioning: SGG’s embarrassingly inaccurate “Ordo 2016” (and 2017), and its equally pathetic “calendar.”  Dannie tried to pass both of them off as “SGG originals” – but both were largely plagiarized copies of other peoples’ efforts.  And even though they were just “copy jobs” – they were still riddled with errors.  It seems that even when they “practices to deceive” by copying someone else’s work, SGG “can’t get it right.”

The truth is, Dannie’s entire tenure at SGG has been one of deception.  Every week, he plies his Gerties with some form of it, trying to convince them that SGG alone is “the real thing” -- and that everyone else isn’t.  In his recent Septuagesima “Corner, for instance (click here), he bad-mouthed everybody from (of course) Bergoglio to Bishop Fellay and the SSPX -- and even blasted Fr. Jenkins and IC, commenting that “Fr. Jenkins has produced a long, rambling and fatally boring video on the old question of the validity of the Thuc consecrations,” then adding, “I presume he’s worried about the number of his faithful who often attend St. Gertrude the Great.”  (Firstly, Dannie, for “fatally boring, try watching one of Tony’s videos!  And secondly, it’s not IC’s folks who are in danger of defecting to SGG, but the opposite – but one can always count on you to misrepresent the facts!)

The fact that deception is a mainstay of Dannie’s “repertoire” should surprise no one, however, for Dannie is Tradistan’s premier and consummate hypocrite; and, after all, deception is what hypocrisy is all about – pretending to be what one is not.  He (and Tony, of course) will continue to “practice to deceive” – except that they’ll be deceiving no one but themselves.  The truth is, his Gerties are seeing through all of this deception -- and the lying and everything else that goes along with it.  Dannie and Tony, who are always representing themselves as Traddieland’s “authorities on everything,” have in fact shown themselves to be nothing more than bungling know-nothings.

So, what say you, Gerties?  We think it’s high time that you stop deceiving yourselves, and -- as Pistrina so aptly put it -- give these imposters the “pink slip” they deserve, and …

Starve the Beast!

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¹ Our article, in fact, prompted one of our readers to write to us and comment “about Dolan’s using the name and reputation of other clergy to garner support for himself by suggesting that they are somehow affiliated with him or supportive of him and his various endeavors, when in fact they are NOT.”  Our correspondent later added, “Now that Dolan is under attack and suffering losses on all sides, he is back to name dropping so people won’t realize how alone he is.”  (For a complete account of what he had to say, click here for our article, Starting to Unravel.)  

² Now one of Dannie’s apologists might argue that it was Sanborn to whom Dannie was referring when he lamented, “How sad to miss Mass for Christmas.”  But, upon inspection, this doesn’t hold up to logic.  As Dannie himself pointed out, it was a Christmas trip (to England) that Big Don missed, not Christmas Mass -- and it was because of back trouble, not snow.  Also, the trip was to be after Christmas anyway; hence, one can only deduce that Dannie was referring to Fr. Mardones – not Big Don -- when he said, “How sad to miss Mass for Christmas.”