Diocese of San Diego
Denies Catholic Funeral Rites
to Bar Owner

by KGTV TheSanDiegoChannel.com
Mar 18, 2005

Funeral services for a man whose nightclubs cater to the gay community were held at an Episcopal church Friday after San Diego Bishop Robert Brom - remember this name - reportedly ruled out Catholic services for the man.

Brom decided not to allow any of the 98 Roman Catholic churches in San Diego or Imperial counties to hold services for Club Montage owner John McCusker Jr. because the diocese deemed his business "inconsistent with Catholic moral teaching," according to The San Diego Union-Tribune.

McCusker, 31, died Sunday of congestive heart failure while vacationing in Mammoth, his family told the newspaper.

Brom made the decision three days later after learning that McCusker's family planned a funeral at the Immaculata Catholic Church on the campus of the University of San Diego, where McCusker attended school, the Union-Tribune reported.

Mike Portantino, a friend of McCusker's and publisher of the San Diego-based Gay & Lesbian Times, said McCusker's family members are devout Catholics and his mother taught catechism, the newspaper reported.

McCusker's funeral was held at St. Paul's Cathedral near Balboa Park, at 11 a.m. Friday, the Union-Tribune reported. It was followed by burial at Temecula Public Cemetery in Temecula.

"Our basic philosophy at the cathedral is whoever you are and wherever you find yourself on the journey of faith, we welcome you," said the Rev. Scott Richardson, St. Paul's dean.

McCusker's popular nightclub, Club Montage, caters to a straight crowd Friday nights and a gay crowd Saturday nights. He also owned a gay bar in North Park called ReBar.

Diocese officials told the Union-Tribune that the bishops' order has nothing to do with the fact McCusker was gay, but rather his "public activity" as a businessman.

A notice on the Club Montage Web site announced that "sadly and regretfully Club Montage is closed indefinitely."

The family asked that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made in McCusker's name to the San Diego Human Dignity Foundation.

Note from Mary: I feel it only fitting to follow this article with the following two articles:

Bishop Robert Brom Accused of Sexual Misconduct

Dallas Morning News 2004

He is one of about a dozen U.S. bishops who have been accused of sexual misconduct in recent years. Catholic leaders in Minnesota, where Bishop Brom - yes, the same Bishop Brom - once headed the Diocese of Duluth, have paid a settlement to a former seminarian who alleged that he was coerced into sex.

A spokeswoman for the bishop recently told The Boston Globe that "minimal insurance" money was paid to the accuser, who agreed to retract his claim. Two archbishops who helped negotiate the deal in the mid-1990s said the man received roughly $100,000. The man alleged that in the 1980s, Bishop Brom and other high-ranking clergymen pressured him and other young men to have sex at a seminary in Winona, Minn. Bishop Brom has denied any sexual misconduct and has said that an investigation disproved what the former seminarian "thought he remembered."

In San Diego after Bishop Brom took over, questions arose about how his top aides handled the 1993 case of the Rev. Emmanuel Omemaga, who was accused of raping a 14-year-old girl after her grandfather's funeral, tying her to a bed and photographing her in bondage. The diocese has said it suspended the priest when it first learned of the accusation, then let him go home to the Philippines on vacation.

Police, meanwhile, began investigating and asked a priest who was one of the bishop's aides to alert them immediately upon Father Omemaga's return. "He agreed to do so" but instead waited five days, according to a police report. At that point, according to the report, the aide left a message saying that he had told the wanted man to call police and to consult an attorney. Father Omemaga vanished and remains the target of an arrest warrant. The aide has said he did everything he could do to bring his fellow priest to justice.

I did a little more digging on the good Bishop and found that whether or not he's a date rapists, he sure sounds like a liar. From the SD Union-Tribune, July 4, 2002 (via Lexis):

Less than three weeks after Bishop Robert Brom assured parishioners that no large settlements have been paid out in priest abuse cases since he took over 12 years ago, the Catholic diocese has acknowledged that a man who said he was molested as a boy received $250,000 in December.... Neither Brom nor Bernadeane Carr, the diocese's spokeswoman, would answer questions yesterday. "We don't have any further comments," Carr said.

Catholic Church Gave
Convicted Priest-Pedophile Full Funeral
After Raping 150 Kids

by Eric Convey
Aug 29, 2003
Boston Herald

Defrocked Priest Buried in Brookline

John J. Geoghan was laid to rest yesterday in a traditional Roman Catholic funeral rite.

Priests and nuns were heavily represented among the two dozen or so mourners who attended the Mass at Holy Name parish in West Roxbury, the Geoghan family church. Geoghan's sister, Catherine, was also there.

An unidentified representative of Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley attended, said the Rev. Christopher Coyne, a spokesman for the archdiocese.

``People from within the Catholic community are reaching out to Cathy,'' Coyne said ``The most important thing when a Christian dies is that the community prays that he or she is sped to heaven.''

Monsignor George F. Carlson, pastor of Holy Name, celebrated the funeral Mass.

Note from Mary: Does anyone else recognize a little inconsistency in the Catholic Church's position here?

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