Dialogue Ireland in its informative education programme in no way recommends or endorses any persons, or organizations on these links pages. We present them only as sources of information for researchers to consider about group-related concerns or questions.
There is a comprehensive attempt of the Palmarians to explain thebeliefsand hopefully it opens up the possibility of dialogue with them.
Official Website of the
Order of the Carmelites of the Holy Face
in company with Jesus and Mary
ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC, APOSTOLIC AND PALMARIAN CHURCH
The true Catholic Church of all times, founded by
Our Lord Jesus Christ
Legitimate Succession of the Cathedra of Saint Peter
Ruled by His Holiness Pope Peter III, De Glória Ecclésiæ
We warn that this is the only official website of the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic and Palmarian Church, approved by the Father General of the Order of Carmelites of the Holy Face, His Holiness Pope Peter III. Any other writing on this Church which may be found on the Internet is not the work of the Holy Palmarian Church and in the majority of cases will lack any truth and will be confusing and imprecise.
Conwoman Debra Marie Burslem who sought refuge in Vanuatu from Australian authorities in 2007 and now resides with followers in Port Vila, and partner John Tonner (right).
This is the first report in a long time. Debra was at forefront of a scam that affected hundreds of Irish families. The small Hamlet of Helidon, near Twowoomba, Queensland was at the centre of operations. She escaped justice in Vanuatu and did a deal with her former assistant Claire Murphy. She and Clare Birchley now present themselves as anti cult experts. Now Debra’s chauffeur John Tonner is her partner. He was formerly married to Claire Murphy her assistant from Ireland to allow her to stay in Australia as the enforcer of Debra’s schemes. You have heard of a baptism of desire, this was not a marriage of desire. The last time I saw John and Debra together was in 2003 when I visited the area. I was in a shopping Magnificat where I saw Debra assisting John to buy underwear. Later that evening I received a visit from the police with a complaint I was stalking Debra and Claire? Needless to say I resisted arrest. Continue reading →
An Bord Pleanála has overturned a Meath County Council decision to exempt the building of a drug detox clinic by the Scientology group, Narconon, in Ballivor, Co Meath.
Meath County Council had found that a change of use from a nursing home to a residential drug rehab facility was not a material change of use and was exempted development which did not require planning permission. Continue reading →
Janet Laveau originally from Winnipeg, Manitoba has a long involvement with Ireland. I first met her and Graeme Wilson when they tried to subvert the case against Mary Johnson here in Dublin around 2002. I was trying to get them to stop Gerard Ryan from sending defamatory material to schools. They were unable to deliver. I visited Saint Hill, East Grinstead along with a number of participants at a Conference put on by Eileen Barker of the LSE and where Heber Jenszch spoke and gave out a door stopper version of What is Scientology. We were shown people speaking to Teddy Bears and outside the Sea Org building there was a drain which was filled with cigarette stubs. When I asked if they had a major addiction problem I was given my first warning by Janet Laveau. Then refreshments in a little building before a speech in a mock up of LRH’s office. When she remarked that his favourite drink was Coca Cola, I insisted it was whiskey. She took me out to library where I was given a final warning.
She is over in Ireland running the show. She is part of the Sea Org which she describes as being similar to a religious order. It is a cross between a state security branch like say Mossad and military intelligence. Its members make a billion year contract. They have a lot of return visits to make to earth. They by definition are not allowed to have children and if married are in a lot of trouble as they are pretty much on a collision course with the S.O. Janet herself has adult children but likely her marriage has gone south. Here in Ireland she is in charge of the National Affairs HQ on Merrion Square and also part of the the Office of Special affairs, (OSA,) intel branch.
Scientologists are all the time telling us that they are a religion but when it comes to Narconon they claim it is secular.
A Richard & Judy item on Scientology Former Scientologist Astra Woodcraft is interviewed, along with a spokeswoman for Scientology, Janet Laveau. Includes details on life inside Scientology, and the policy of compulsory abortions for female members of the “Sea Orgs”. Channel 4, Oct 11 2005
Note Janet Leveau is addressed as Reverend and she tries to explain the abuse by referring to those that oppose them as apostates. In other words turning away from the true religion. Continue reading →
This plan which seemed watertight last March when this article was published by the Meath Chronicle was thrown on its head yesterday.
Bord Pleanala has ruled that the change from a nursing home to a drug rehabilitation centre is not exempted development and would be a “factual change of use.”
Narconon has broken its silence on its plans for a drug rehabilitation centre in Ballivor revealing details of the €5.6m project on the site of the former national school in the village which will accommodate 34 recovering addicts and 18 staff.
After months of speculation on what was happening with the site- which has planning for a nursing home- Narconon only last week confirmed they intend to open a drug rehabilitation facility.
When challenged on why it had taken until now to reveal its plans, Ms Laveau said they “weren’t finished on the planning and that was really the simplicity of it”, adding “there wasn’t a lot to say or show until we had actually finished it.”
How the new Narconon facility in Ballivor is expected to look
She outlined they had spent almost a year looking for a suitable property and went through 200 properties before finding Ballivor and then put the full proposal from Narconon in to Meath County Council in August 2016.
So why Ballivor? Ms Laveau gave the reasons behind their decision to locate there: “We were searching with different estate agents and it was the right size and had the correct zoning and was conveniently located in a central location. We had found another location down in Cork but that was a problem because it was way down the bottom and was not very accessible. Here gave us somewhere that we could easily get to.
“It’s also an idyllic rural setting. People want to get out if the environment that they are in because they know they are vulnerable to temptation on one hand and on the other hand you have people who don’t want everyone to know.”
She added: “No other property fitted the bill and then there was talk I saw that it was right across from a school so we looked at maps of other rehabilitation centres and you can see they have similar.
The former national school in Ballivor as it looks at the moment. No date has been set for the start of construction.
“What we always do is work with the building that is there and try to enhance and bring new life to it.”
Once the council had responded that it would be an exempted development, they started the process of acquiring the property.
“We had been straight up front right at the beginning, who we were and what we wanted to do and so forth, but you know contrary to what some people may think we are not publicity seekers at all. We just manage to get a lot of publicity so when we do something, you have to go through the whole planning stages so we have this raw shell to work with but what are we going to do.
“It is a bit like Christmas time when you go to a shopping centre, they are going to like cover their windows until they are ready to show you what their window displays are like, It is the same kind of a thing.”
When put to them that they had targeted a property with a live planning permission, Ms Laveau agreed this was the case. “Absolutely. Whenever we buy any kind of a property, like if we were going to open up a new church in any city, you have areas where you have zonings for those kind of activities.”
Mr O’Byrne gave the example of Firhouse centre where there was already planning for a church.
The Narconon/Scientology representatives were anxious to show how the former national school in Ballivor will look transformed into the 34-bed drug rehabilitation centre.
Regarding lessening the chance for objection from the local community, Ms Laveau claimed this wasn’t part of the “thinking process”.
“Actually the objection from the community wasn’t part of the thinking process…..The fact it already had planning permission was a bonus, it wasn’t one of the criteria, it was simply whether that area would be zoned for that type of usage is the thing that we look for. So we lucked out that it already had it.”
On not being welcome in the area and how that comes into the thinking on a development like this, Ms Laveau said: “ When we first started this project, we were completely upfront. And we put the planning application in with a complete description of the programme. And the planning committee and so forth reviewed it and approved it and there were no objections to it.”
Janet Laveau, National Affairs Office, Church of Scientology, (above right), Linda Alred, Narconon Co-ordinator (top left) and programme graduate and rehabilitation secretary for Ballivor, Brian McWeeney pictured at our offices last Friday (Feb 23rd).
When challenged that there was no opportunity to object when it is an exempted development, Ms Laveau said: “We didn’t know that. In the UK at Saint Hill, we had a lot of renovations and everything you do, you get your planning permission, it gets posted in the newspaper and it gets posted outside. I don’t think anybody ever thought anything of it, we put the paperwork through.”
Ms Laveau has openly admitted they were taken aback by the level of resistance to their plans.
“I’ve never seen anything like this in my entire life. Never, I’ve been working with Narconon since the early 80s and I’ve never personally experienced anything but complete acceptance because the programme makes so much sense to people.”
They claim the centre will be worth €800,000 per year to the local community and that cooks, gardeners, housekeeping and maintenance staff will be locally hired.
A contractor has not yet been appointed and they don’t have an opening date yet.
About 50 per cent of participants are expected to come from outside Ireland.
A price has not yet been set for their programme in Ireland and say it depends on the economics of the individual country but it is not-for-profit and there is no margin. In the UK centre, the cost is £18,000 for the programme which averages at four months.
When asked about the type of person who will attend the centre when it opens, Ms Laveau said: “One of the key concerns is are we going to see strange looking drug addicts running around the city. That is not the case with Narconon, Narconon is a private rehabilitation programme and it is a drug free programme, it only takes people who are wanting themselves to get off the drugs. If you don’t have somebody that has made that decision themselves personally for their own reasons to get off drugs, it won’t happen.”
Mr O’Bryne said their key message to the people of Ballivor is “to tell them the facts, that they haven’t heard before because we haven’t talked to them about them yet”. He feels there is a huge amount of misinformation out there, and Ms Laveau said a lot of the concerns are being created by a few individuals.
So how are they going to try to sell this to the community particularly if they have a barrier up?
“We are totally willing to talk to people, we want to talk to people. There is a huge problem in Ireland, even in the Ballivor area that there is a big drugs problem. Heroin is one that is specifically brought up along with prescription drugs and cannabis. It’s the human factor, I don’t know what else to say. We’re willing to talk to people, we want to brief them, we want to let them know that this is not something scary or that it’s not going to bring a benefit to the community.”
What would they like to say to the people of Ballivor who are extremely worried of the prospect of a centre in their community?
“There’s nothing to worry about firstly,” said Mr O’Byrne.
“What we would like to say is that Narconon is really dedicated to addressing the issue of drugs, offering a drug free withdrawal programme that restores people’s lives. It’s a safe programme and it is going to bring, I think, a significant benefit to the community both in terms of economic injection in to the area and with very stringent security measure in place so that it is a safe programme and enhances the environment,” said Ms Laveau.
While they aren’t open to the idea of addressing a public meeting, they say they are willing to meet with smaller groups and anyone who wants to talk to them about the proposal should contact info@narconon.ie.
Before Herzl, There Was Pastor Russell: A Neglected Chapter of Zionism in the Haaretz Magazine.
Years before Theodor Herzl proposed creating a Jewish state, Charles Taze Russell was traveling the world holding Jewish Mass Meetings, beginning in 1879, at which he urged Jews to find a national home in Eretz Israel
Charles Taze Russell (1852-1916)
|
“There are now in the world more than ten million Jews, about three-quarters of whom are in Russia, Poland, the Balkan States, and Turkey. If the movement toward Palestine should get the impulse that the Hirsch committee is able to give it, an imaginative person can conceive of the country’s doubling or trebling its Jewish population before the close of our century” – Zion’s Watchtower 1892, Nov. 1, p.329.
Charles Taze Russell
Charles Taze Russell ללא קרדיט
Theodor Herzl published his pamphlet “Der Judenstaat” in 1896 and, two years later, organized the world’s First Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland. But in fact, the notion of a Jewish state in Palestine had been making the rounds in European and American Christian circles, in various forms. One of its keenest proponents was a Christian preacher and Bible scholar named Charles Taze Russell (1852-1916).
The proposition boldly put forward by Pastor Russell contrasted with the position of many Christian churches at the time, where the feeling was that God’s covenant with the Jews had long since ended and they should convert to Christianity.
The prescient pastor predicted a massive exodus of Jews from Russia and Eastern Europe. Much as he predicted, by 1924 more than 3 million Jews had emigrated from Russia and Eastern Europe. Russell himself did not live long enough to see his prophecy made manifest, dying in 1916.
Russell’s legacy as an enthusiastic, non-proselytizing Zionist has been acknowledged by none other than the incumbent prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, who said, “A recognition of Pastor Russell’s important role as an early American Christian advocate of Zionism is long overdue.” The late Jeane Kirkpatrick, former the U.S. ambassador to the UN, called Russell a “neglected man and chapter in the history of Zionism.”
Who was this forgotten father of Zionism, and why would he promote Zionism in the first place?
In the mid-19th century, when covered wagons still rolled across the open plains carrying settlers to remote sectors of America, when vast herds of buffalo still roamed the range, Charles Taze Russell was born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania on February 16, 1852. He was the second son of Joseph L. and Ann Eliza Russell, both of Scottish-Irish descent.
Russell’s mother died when he was nine years old. At 11, Charles entered a business partnership with his father, the youngster himself writing the articles of agreement under which their enterprise operated. At 15 he and his father were running a flourishing men’s clothing chain with shops in Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and more.
Russell’s formative years were colored by the devastating Civil War that ravaged America from 1861 to 1865, followed by an era of rapid industrialization. In 1869 the first transcontinental railway was completed. Come the 1870’s, electric light and the telephone came onto the scene. The electric streetcar would arrive in the 1880’s, and by the century’s end, a few automobiles would be noisily proclaiming their presence.
On the intellectual front, Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, described in his 1859 book “On the Origin of Species,” had for the first time seriously challenged the Roman Catholic Church’s version of history, giving rise to spin-off churches and creeds.
Going back to basics
This setting of breakneck development and intellectual progress is where Russell founded the Bible Student Association, which aspired to go back to basics by studying the Bible itself.
Soon a class for systematic Bible Study was formed in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, and in 1879 Charles Taze Russell was elected its pastor. The movement founded Zion’s Watch Tower, the most widely circulated magazine in the world today, according to Business Insider, with an average of 70 million copies a month in 334 languages. For comparison, National Geographic has a circulation of something over 6 million and is published in 25 different languages.
A few years later, in 1881, Russell was elected the first president of the Watchtower Society. Its purpose was to distribute his teachings in the form of tracts.
Russell was a prolific writer, and his major accomplishments include a six-volume series of systematic theology, “Studies in the Scriptures.” By 1909 this series was one of most widely circulated works in the world, surpassed only by the Bible and The Chinese Almanac.
His crowning achievement at that phase was “The Photo-Drama of Creation,” a ground-breaking innovation that combined sound and color in a motion picture for the first time in history. The film was, viewed by more than eight million people, an astronomical success in terms of the times.
In 1909 Russell moved The Watch Tower Society Headquarters to 124 Columbia Heights in Brooklyn Heights. It would remain there until 2016, when Jared Kushner, son-in-law of U.S. President Donald Trump, bought the property.
Early advocate of Zionism
On August 18, 1891, now in Jerusalem, Russell wrote to the philanthropists Baron Maurice de Hirsch and Baron Edmond de Rothschild, or as he puts it “the two leading Hebrews of the world.” No less, he put forward a practical plan for Zionism.
It involved purchasing all government-owned land in Palestine, i.e., land not held by private owners, from the impoverished Ottoman Empire. Years later Herzl would make similar proposals. (A copy of the letter is published in “Zion’s Watchtower and Herald of Christ’s Presence”, December 1891, pp. 170-171.)
“As you will see from my books, we find the testimony of the prophets to be, that your nation will be greatly blessed and return to divine favor between now and the year 1915, A.D.,” Russell wrote. The persecutions that Jews were suffering in Russia were “a mark of divine favor rather than the reverse,” the pastor suggested – and it would only get worse because the Lord’s purpose was to drive the Jews “out of all lands whither he has scattered them.”
Pyramid chart from the 1911 Bible Students Convention Souvenir Report. At this time, the Bible Students in association with Pastor Charles Taze Russell believed that the Great Pyramid of Gizeh in Egypt confirmed biblical chronology. They believed the Great Pyramid confirmed their predictions for the year 1914. Pyramidology was rejected by the Bible Students in 1928 by J.F. Rutherford, Russell’s successor, who later renamed the movement Jehovah’s Witnesses.
The Bible Students in association with Pastor Russell thought the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt confirmed biblical chronology.
To where? To Palestine, as apparently indicated by the prophet (Jeremiah 32:37-44; 33:6-22), Russell explained. Owning not an inch of that land, he had no vested interest, the pastor elaborated, and went on: “My suggestion is that the wealthy Hebrews purchase from Turkey, at a fair valuation, all of her property interest in these lands: i.a., all of the Government lands (lands not held by private owners), under the provision that Syria and Palestine shall be constituted a FREE STATE…”
In his letter, Russell delicately gibes at alternative “Jewish homeland” ideas touted at the time in places other than Israel, though Baron de Hirsch was actually involved in resettling Jews elsewhere: “But please note, my dear Sir, that the sacred Scriptures predict the return to Palestine, and not a further wandering to the ends of the earth—to America or elsewhere. And, therefore, it is my humble opinion that Israel will find no rest for the sole of his foot until he finds the land of promise; and I pray you, therefore, not to waste your efforts in assisting emigration elsewhere, but concentrate them in the direction where God has indicated success…”
We cannot know whether he even replied to Russell, let alone be influenced by him. But a month after Russell’s letter to the barons, on September 11th, 1891, Baron Hirsch founded the Jewish Colonization Association to buy land, principally in North and South America but in Palestine too, where agricultural colonies could be established and resettled by Jews who were persecuted in Russia.
Meanwhile, the pastor’s message did not go unnoticed in the broader Jewish communities of the United States and Europe.
Russell’s Yiddish newspaper
In 1910 Pastor Russell received a letter from a committee of Jewish leaders:
“Dear Sir: Your Sympathetic interest in the Jewish people for years past has not escaped our notice. Your denunciation of the atrocities perpetrated against our race in the name of Christianity has added to our conviction that you are a sincere friend,” wrote the committee members.
“Your discourse on “Jerusalem and Jewish Hopes” has struck a responsive chord in the hearts of many of our people. Still we doubted for a time if any Christian minister could really be interested in a Jew as a Jew and merely from a hope of proselyting him…You may well understand how surprised we are to find a Christian minister acknowledging that there are prophecies of the Bible still fulfilled, which belong to the Jew and not to the Christian…
“These things, Pastor Russell, have led to the formation of a Jewish Mass Meeting Committee, which by this letter, request you to give a public discourse,” they concluded.
The pastor acceded and on October 9, 1910, gave a talk titled “Zionism in Prophecy” before an audience of about 4,000 Jews at the Hippodrome, New York’s largest and finest auditorium at the time.
As The New York American reported on that day, “The unusual spectacle of 4,000 Hebrews enthusiastically applauding a Gentile preacher, after having listened to a sermon he addressed to them concerning their own religion…where Pastor Russell, the famous head of the Brooklyn Tabernacle conducted a most unusual service. It was not long before all reserve, and all possible doubt of Pastor Russell’s entire sincerity and friendliness were worn away. Then the mention of the name of a great leader [Herzl] who, the speaker declared, had been raised by God for the cause — brought a burst of applause.”
Russell held similar mass meetings in Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Kansas City, and Cincinnati. In England, he addressed 4,600 Jews in London’s Royal Albert Hall, following which he appeared in Glasgow and Manchester, then gave talks in other European cities with large Jewish populations, including Vienna, Berlin, Krakow, and Budapest.
Make no mistake, his speeches got a mixed reception. After Russell had left one meeting, three Jewish groups got into such a row that 46 policemen were called to disperse them. A Jewish rabbi in New York who fiercely opposed Russell influenced his associates in Austria-Hungary to resist plans for meetings addressing Jews.
However, the Herzl Year Book provides statistics of the printed preaching on the subject of Judaism and Zionism, which appeared in 107,000 copies of Anglo-Jewish newspapers and weeklies, and in 650,000 copies of the Yiddish Press. Russell even published a Yiddish-language paper of his own, Die Shtimme – “the voice”.
Separate covenants
Why would a devout Christian minister invest so much in advocating the idea of a national homeland for the Jews?
In May 26, 1911, Jacob De Haas, editor of the Boston Jewish Advocate and a personal confidant of Herzl, published an article in the Jewish Advocate praising Russell as a “Philo-semite” with no desire to convert the Jews.
Butquestion of Russell’s motivation doesn’t lead to philo-Semitism necessarily: rather it goes to the prophecies of restoration delivered to ancient Israel by prophets in the Bible (Jeremiah 30:18; 31-8-10; Amos 9:14,15; Romans 22:25,26).
“And I will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them, and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them” – Amos 9:14, for example
Russell was confident that these verses would be fulfilled and that God would restore the Jews to Palestine. In November 1892 he wrote in Zion’s Watch Tower: “There are now in the world more than ten million Jews, about three-quarters of whom, are in Russia, Poland, the Balkan States, and Turkey. If the movement toward Palestine should get the impulse that the Hirsch committee is able to give it, an imaginative person can conceive of the country’s doubling or trebling its Jewish population before the close of our century, and of it’s having a larger Jewish population fifty years hence than it had in ancient times, when its census ran up to three million. Should the restoration be accomplished, all hail to the New Jerusalem!”
He also believed that God had a separate covenant with the Jews and a different covenant with Christians, writing in the Watch Tower, in January 1909, page 28: “The more closely we investigate the New Covenant, the more we must be convinced of this fact – that it belongs to Israel alone.”
These were the sentiments on which Russell’s advocacy of Zionism was based. While he may not have lived to see the fulfillment of his wishes, his legacy continued.
He died in 1916. In 1925, his successor Judge Joseph F. Rutherford wrote the book “Comfort for the Jews.”
Rutherford is rather more renowned for founding Jehovah’s Witnesses, a religious group that emerged from Russell’s Bible Student Movement.
Before Russell, no Anglo-Jewish newspapers or Yiddish press had carried articles by a Christian minister. When he died on October 31, 1916, the Herzl Year Book observed:”Russell himself, according to the testimony of the American Jewish Press from the years 1910 to 1916, maintained excellent and friendly relations with the leaders of American Jewry to his last days.”
