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Solidarity in the fight against Ritual Abuse and Torture by Neil Brick, presented at the 2004 Association for Humanist Sociology Conference is now online at http://members.aol.com/smartnews/ahs_04.htm
Secret German Cult in Chile Breaks 43-Year Spell 11/8/04 By Fiona Ortiz Villa Baviera, Chile (Reuters) "A religious cult of German immigrants has broken decades of isolation from a world shocked by sex-abuse scandals in the group, the flight of its secretive leader and reports it once helped Chile's military government torture political prisoners. In exclusive interviews, members of the 280-person sect ended decades of public silence to tell Reuters they had emerged from a long nightmare to the painful realization their God-like guru -- a fugitive facing child-sex charges -- had broken apart their families and fostered physical abuse. The sect came here in the 1960s following Paul Schaefer, a charismatic World War II German army nurse, who cult members thought was God on earth and who preached an unnamed religion that said harsh discipline would draw them closer to the supreme being. "Everyone saw him as a celestial being and no one dared doubt him. People were blind here. It was a huge shock to discover the truth," said Michael Mueller, a 47-year-old member of the community's newly elected reform committee.....The apocalyptic cult barred itself behind a perimeter fence guarded by cameras and motion detectors, and once even taunted police with Nazi salutes. A judge is probing reports it provided torture chambers for the secret police during Chile's 1973-1990 military dictatorship. Schaefer came to Chile fleeing sex-abuse charges in Germany, and in 1961 founded Colonia Dignidad -- later renamed Villa Baviera. Schaefer, now believed to be 81 and whose whereabouts are unknown, banned television and telephones and blotted references to love and sex out of the Bible. The cult lived frozen in time, singing German folk songs and working the fields wearing 1930s Bavarian peasant garb. Sect leaders cozied up to Augusto Pinochet's military regime in the 1970s and 1980s, seeking protection from critics who wanted to break up what they saw as a state within a state. Schaefer disappeared in 1997, again fleeing child sex-abuse charges, this time filed by Chilean authorities after some two dozen children who went to the cult's free clinic and school reported abuse." http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=6747918
fwd from L Moss Sharman Support for Suits Claiming Child Abuse by Charities By Laura Mansnerus Trenton 11/9/04 "John W. Hardwicke Jr. describes his two years at the American Boychoir School as a hellish series of encounters with pedophiles on the school's staff, led by the choirmaster who was in charge of the boys 24 hours a day. For more than 30 years, Mr. Hardwicke says, the consequences have been devastating. In most states, Mr. Hardwicke would be free to sue the school for negligence in its hiring and oversight of the choirmaster. But New Jersey continues to provide a legal shield to negligence lawsuits against charitable institutions like the Boychoir School, the state's Roman Catholic archdiocese, the Boy Scouts and other groups that work with children. That soon may change. On Monday, a General Assembly committee, after three hours of wrenching stories from more than a dozen victims, approved a measure that would allow many people sexually abused as children to go to court after years of silence. A favorable vote by the full Assembly, which is expected soon, would send the bill to the governor's desk. And the State Supreme Court has agreed to reconsider its much-disputed decision in 1984 to bar a suit against the Archdiocese of Newark by the family of a boy who had been sexually abused by a priest. At the end of this month, the court will hear arguments in a new case, which was brought by Mr. Hardwicke." http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/09/nyregion/09choir.html?oref=login&oref=login&pagewanted=print&position www.ctrl.org DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
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