Archangel Michael: The Declaration of Human Freedom

The 2012 Scenario, Steve Beckow, October 8, 2012

For more than a year, I’ve carried around the secret of who authored this document. I think I leaked out the author’s name on one occasion. But the real author – Archangel Michael – and I agreed that a time would arrive when I could say publicly that he wrote it. But for the time being it would be best to say I did.

If anything I am the author only of the mistakes that went into it each time my ego got in the way. I had to go back and take out my mistakes because I knew when my ego had kicked in.

AAM wrote it to support World Freedom Day, which was staged on March 6, 2011.

So I repost it with the real author’s name attached and am glad to set the record straight.

The Declaration of Human Freedom

Archangel Michael, Feb. 19, 2011

Every being is a divine and eternal soul living in a temporal body. Every being was alive before birth and will live after death.

Every soul enters into physical life for the purpose of experience and education, that it may, in the course of many lifetimes, learn its true identity as a fragment of the Divine.

Life itself is a constant process of spiritual evolution and unfoldment, based on free choice, that continues until such time as we realize our true nature and return to the Divine from which we came.

No soul enters life to serve another, except by choice, but to serve its own purpose and that of the Divine from which it came.

All life is governed by natural and universal laws which precede and outweigh the laws of humanity. These laws, such as the law of karma, the law of attraction, and the law of free will, are decreed by God to order existence and assist each person to achieve life’s purpose.

No government can or should survive that derives its existence from the enforced submission of its people or that denies its people their basic rights and freedoms.

Life is a movement from one existence to another, in varied venues throughout the universe and in other universes and dimensions of existence. We are not alone in the universe but share it with other civilizations, most of them peace-loving, many of whom are more advanced than we are, some of whom can be seen with our eyes and some of whom cannot.

The evidence of our five senses is not the final arbiter of existence. Humans are spiritual as well as physical entities and the spiritual side of life transcends the physical. God is a Spirit and the final touchstone of God’s Truth is not physical but spiritual. The Truth is to be found within.

God is one and, because of this, souls are one. They form a unity. They are meant to live in peace and harmony together in a “common unity” or community. The use of force to settle affairs runs contrary to natural law. Every person should have the right to conduct his or her own affairs without force, as long as his or her choices do not harm another.

No person shall be forced into marriage against his or her will. No woman shall be forced to bear or not bear children, against her will. No person shall be forced to hold or not hold views or worship in a manner contrary to his or her choice. Nothing vital to existence shall be withheld from another if it is within the community’s power to give.

Every person shall retain the ability to think, speak, and act as they choose, as long as they not harm another. Every person has the right to choose, study and practice the education and career of their choice without interference, provided they not harm another.

No one has the right to kill another. No one has the right to steal from another. No one has the right to force himself or herself upon another in any way.

Any government that harms its citizens, deprives them of their property or rights without their consent, or makes offensive war upon its neighbors, no matter how it misrepresents the situation, has lost its legitimacy. No government may govern without the consent of its people. All governments are tasked with seeing to the wellbeing of their citizens. Any government which forces its citizens to see to its own wellbeing without attending to theirs has lost its legitimacy.

Men and women are meant to live fulfilling lives, free of want, wherever they wish and under the conditions they desire, providing their choices do not harm another and are humanly attainable.

Children are meant to live lives under the beneficent protection of all, free of exploitation, with unhindered access to the necessities of life, education, and health care.

All forms of exploitation, oppression, and persecution run counter to universal and natural law. All disagreements are meant to be resolved amicably.

Any human law that runs counter to natural and universal law is invalid and should not survive. The enactment or enforcement of human law that runs counter to natural and universal law brings consequences that cannot be escaped, in this life or another. While one may escape temporal justice, one does not escape divine justice.

All outcomes are to the greater glory of God and to God do we look for the fulfillment of our needs and for love, peace, and wisdom. So let it be. Aum/Amen.

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"THE BRIDGE OF SWORDS"– Sep  29, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Text version) - New

"Recalibration of Free Choice"–  Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Loose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth,  4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical)  8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.) - (Text version)

Church sex scandal takes toll on victims' lawyers

Associated Press, Sep. 24, 2010 6:15 AM ET

BOSTON (AP) — Attorney Ray Boucher helped secure a record $660 million settlement from the Los Angeles Archdiocese on behalf of more than 500 people molested by priests. Five days after the settlement was announced, his wife left him.

In this Thursday, June 24, 2010 photo,
Eric MacLeish poses for a photograph in
Plymouth, N.H. MacLeish, who represented
clergy sexual abuse victims in Boston,
helped spur the resignation of Cardinal
Bernard Law. (AP Photo/Cheryl Senter)

Eric MacLeish, the hard-charging lawyer whose work for victims helped spur the resignation of Boston's Cardinal Bernard Law in 2002, later suffered a breakdown, stopped practicing law and got divorced.

And Steve Rubino, once such an observant Catholic he couldn't believe a priest would molest a child, lost his faith and eventually retired from the law.

"It moved me completely out of whatever religious context I was in — completely," he said.

The sex scandal that rocked the nation's Roman Catholic Church took a fearsome personal toll on some of the top lawyers who dared to challenge the institution.

While many of them ultimately reaped large fees for their services, the all-consuming workload, the pressure of battling the church and the stress of listening to graphic accounts of children's suffering were debilitating.

"No one can handle these cases and come out of it the same," said Sylvia Demarest, a lawyer who helped win a $119.6 million verdict against the Diocese of Dallas in 1997 and later built a national database on clergy sex abuse cases.

Demarest, now semiretired, said she grew frustrated with her inability to heal the wounds suffered by her clients. "What happens to kids when they're abused and what happens to their brains when they are abused is something that we don't know how to fix," she said.

The crisis exploded in Boston in 2002, after internal church documents released publicly showed that church leaders for decades had shuffled sexually abusive priests from parish to parish. The scandal spread across the country as thousands of lawsuits were filed by people who claimed they had been victimized.

For MacLeish, the clergy cases reawakened memories of being sexually abused as a child.

MacLeish and other lawyers won an $85 million settlement in Boston in 2003 for more than 500 victims. But in the months after the landmark settlement was announced, MacLeish began to unravel. He developed insomnia and nausea, lost 40 pounds and couldn't work.

He was rattled by the image of a 9-year-old boy who was repeatedly sodomized over nine hours by a priest. The boy buried his bloody underwear so his mother wouldn't find out.

"The idea of him going off into the woods and burying his underwear, that really got to me," MacLeish said.

MacLeish had been sexually abused by a family friend during a camping trip at 15. And he had memories of being molested at an English boarding school he attended as a boy.

"I began to realize why I had been doing this work and how much my own abuse had affected me," he said.

He said his pursuit of the church "was absolutely never about money." He added: "The wealth I received was the knowledge that I had really helped my clients and helped to change the Catholic Church."

Rubino, who retired last year after more than 20 years of representing clergy sex-abuse victims, was incredulous after a family friend came to him in 1987 and said a priest had sexually assaulted her 14-year-old son.

"I said, 'Well, that's impossible. Priests are celibate. What are you talking about?'" recalled Rubino, who grew up in a large Italian Catholic family.

Rubino, whose law office was in Margate City, N.J., spent the next 15 years becoming a canon law expert.

He traveled all over the U.S and to Ireland, Canada and Australia to represent victims and help other lawyers. Story after story of abuse left Rubino disheartened about the Catholic Church.

"I was a true believer. I said my Hail Marys, my Act of Contrition, I learned Latin, I served Mass, I believed in God," he said. "I don't do any of that now."

At the height of the scandal, Rubino was working 16- to 20-hour days and traveling constantly. His wife and three children resented it. "While I was (home), I was never there," he said. "I was a second away from the next text, the next e-mail, the next phone call from a client."

Rubino's marriage survived, but Boucher's did not. Boucher's wife left him right after the 2007 settlement in Los Angeles.

"She just said, 'Look, you're on top of the world, the press is surrounding you, I haven't accomplished what I want to accomplish in life, and I just don't feel like I can stay with you,'" Boucher said. (Boucher's ex-wife, Christine Roberts, declined to comment.)

Before that, Boucher had plowed through hundreds of cases in Los Angeles, and mostly managed to "box it up and store it away." But, at times, the enormity of the pain caused by the abuse was overwhelming.

In 2004, Boucher was editing DVDs of victims describing how they were raped or otherwise molested by a priest. He saw a pile of about 150 DVDs ready to be mailed to Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony. Each DVD cover had a picture of the victim as a child, as they were when they were assaulted.

"I was stunned. I looked at them, and I'm sure I started to cry," Boucher recalled. "I will never lose that image."

MacLeish's marriage also ended in divorce. Diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, he began seeing a psychologist. Within two months, they were sleeping together and their affair led to his divorce, MacLeish said.

MacLeish, now a professor who teaches civil rights and criminal procedure at Plymouth State University in New Hampshire, said he doesn't regret the work he did, despite the toll it took on him and his family.

"There is not one case that I've heard of since 2004 where a known pedophile has been placed by the church into an organization where he would be able to do it again," he said.

Rubino, 61, now spends time with his family and works as chief executive of a sports performance training center for kids. Rubino said it is a respite from the work he used to do.

"For the hundreds of damaged young lives I represented, the kids at (the center) are at the opposite end of the spectrum," he said.

Boucher, 53, continues to represent victims.

"I can't imagine walking away from people who are suffering from the isolation of sexual abuse," he said. "I don't know how — no matter what the personal, emotional toll might be — I don't know how you walk away from that."

Mary MacKillop will be canonized in Vatican making her the first Australian Saint.
In 1871 Mackillop was excommunicated because she exposed a Case of Pedophilia

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German Catholic Church rewrites sex abuse guidelines

BBC News, 31 August 2010 Last updated at 16:44 GMT

The Catholic Church in Germany has issued tougher guidelines on the handling of reports of sex abuse.

Germany, the Pope's home country, has been one
of many countries hit by sex abuse accusations

The revised rules insist all allegations must be reported to prosecutors in an attempt to prevent cases being covered up.

But critics say the new advice does not go far enough to tackle the issue.

The Catholic Church in Germany and other European countries has been hit by repeated accusations of abuse.

Since the start of 2010, at least 300 people have alleged sexual or physical abuse by priests across Germany, the Pope's home country.

The new code firms up existing guidelines from 2002 which were criticised as being too weak.

The old guidelines had not required cases to be reported to law enforcement agencies, and had instead only "advised" it if the allegations were "proven".

'Imprecise'

Bishop of Trier, Stephan Ackermann, said the change of emphasis would mean cases being sent to police more quickly and that no-one found guilty of abuse would be able to work with children.

"The dreadful findings and experiences of recent months have shown us that the (previous) guidelines of 2002 were imprecise in some areas," he said.

"We also want to make sure that as many victims as possible... have the courage to come forward," he added, speaking in Trier in western Germany.

The code requires each diocese to have a "commissioner" who would serve as the first point of contact for anyone reporting abuse perpetrated by a Church insider.

But Christian Weisner of the We Are Church group said he did not believed the rules were broad enough, and said he wanted Germany to have a "zero tolerance" policy towards the issue.

"Once he has been an offender, we really don't want someone like that in the diocese anymore, even working in a nursing home or a prison," Mr Weisner told AP news agency.

He added that the guidelines also did not address financial compensation for victims.

The Church has acknowledged that it has failed to adequately investigate cases of abuse, and in some cases there was a cover-up with those accused being moved to a different diocese.

Many cases relate to abuse that occurred several decades ago.

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New Vatican laws could be "church PR disaster"

RNW, 15 July 2010 - 4:41pm | By Marijke Peters

(Photo: Flickr/Rachmaninoff)

The Vatican has published new rules on child sex abuse in the Catholic church, after a worldwide scandal badly damaged its reputation. The laws will increase the number of years after which priests can face punishment from their superiors, but victims groups say they don’t go far enough.

The new measures come in response to a deluge of complaints that the Vatican isn’t doing enough to investigate abuse claims in the church. Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said the measures include “more rapid procedures to deal with the most urgent and serious situations more effectively”.

Out of touch

But while the move has been welcomed as an attempt to take the issue of child sex abuse more seriously, some say the church isn’t in touch with public opinion.

The decision to class possession of child pornography in the same category as the ordination of women priests was described as “clumsy” by Vatican expert and history professor Peter Nissen from Radboud University in the Netherlands:

“They don’t show very much awareness of how the public opinion will view things, they don’t show any feelings for the seriousness of complaints concerning sexual abuse and child pornography by dealing with it in the same way as cases of the ordination of women.”

Time delay

Another area of concern is the canon law statute of limitations. Until now, victims could only pursue complaints against priests for ten years after their 18th birthday – this has now been doubled to 20 years. But a raft of cases uncovered earlier this year by Radio Netherlands Worldwide revealed many victims don’t report abuse until years after the event.

Bert Smeets from the Mea Culpa United victims’ group said there shouldn’t be a statute of limitations at all: “Sexual abuse is a lifetime thing. This is escapism by the church. They’re trying to mislead you – they give you a few extra years, but the problem will be the same… Even if you get 20 years after the 18th birthday, most of the cases are still on the statute of limitations.”

The new rules update a 2001 document signed by Pope Benedict’ XVI’s predecessor John Paul II and don’t deal with handing abusers over to state criminal authorities. Internal church investigations will continue to be held behind closed doors “to protect the dignity of everyone involved,” says Lombardi.

Even worse

Rather than repairing any damage done to the Vatican’s reputation by the child abuse allegations, the laws may actually make the situation worse, says Professor Nissen:

“I fear it will be the next PR disaster. We’ve seen a number of them so I don’t think these changes will really convince the critics of the way the church has up to now dealt with cases of sexual abuse, and again it shows some kind of clumsiness in dealing with public opinion.”

Three ‘bishops’ at the ordination of a female French priest in Lyons in 2005. All four women were excommunicated. From left: South African Patricia Fresen, Austrian Christine Mayr-Lumetzberger and German Gisela Forster. Photograph: Jean-Pierre Clatot/AFP

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Vatican set to revise rules on sexual abuse

Reuters, By Philip Pullella, VATICAN CITY | Thu Jul 8, 2010 9:28am EDT

(Reuters) - The Vatican next week will revise Church law on sexual abuse of children by priests, doubling a statute of limitations and introducing penalties for child pornography, Catholic Church sources said on Thursday.

The changes come as Pope Benedict struggles to control the damage a sexual abuse scandal in the United States and several European countries, including his native Germany, has done to the Catholic Church's image.

The revisions will effectively make legal procedures about abuse cases known as "special faculties," which were so far allowed only under exceptional circumstances, the global norms.

"The special faculties have been transformed into law. They have been written in stone," said one Church official familiar with the new rules, expected to be made public next Thursday.

The statute of limitations for sexual abuse cases will be increased to 20 years after the victim's 18th birthday from the current 10 years, meaning victims will be able to file charges until they are 38 years old.

This is significant because many people who were abused by priests as children do not find the courage or legal and moral support to come forward until they are well into adulthood.

OF HIS OWN ACCORD

The revisions will also allow local bishops to defrock priests where evidence of sexual abuse is "clear and grave" without canonical (ecclesiastical) trials, which can be lengthy and costly. The Church will be able to defrock priests in such cases by decree.

The changes are an update to a document known as a Motu Proprio (Latin for "of his own accord") issued by the late Pope John Paul in 2001 to deal with sexual abuse cases.

It has been prepared by the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, the department Pope Benedict headed as a cardinal for nearly 25 years before his election in 2005.

The revision will also specify that priests found to possess child pornography, either in print or on their computers, will be considered to have committed a serious offence subject to disciplinary action even if they are not abusers.

Five bishops in Europe have already resigned over the scandal. One has admitted sexual abuse, another is under investigation and three have stepped down over their handling of abuse cases.

Last month, Benedict begged forgiveness from God and victims of child sexual abuse by priests and vowed that the Catholic Church would do everything in its power to ensure that it never happens again.

Three ‘bishops’ at the ordination of a female French priest in Lyons in 2005. All four women were excommunicated. From left: South African Patricia Fresen, Austrian Christine Mayr-Lumetzberger and German Gisela Forster. Photograph: Jean-Pierre Clatot/AFP

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