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RELIGION
Stained Glass Scandal Rocks Catholic Church
WASHINGTON (CAP) - Catholic leaders are scambling to deal with a scandal that threatens to shake the very foundation of the church, and the search for answers is leading many to more and more questions.
"We trusted those priests," said devout follower Ann O'Shea. "And look at what they did! They betrayed our trust! I mean, if you can't trust your priest to do the right thing, this is terrible! Oh God, this is terrible!"
Though originally thought to be concentrated in just a few churches on the East Coast, the scandal has quickly spread, and cases have now been reported in all 50 states, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
"In thousands of church buildings throughout the country, preists have been taking young men, late at night, and having them install fake stained glass windows," said famed private investigator William Alba. "No one is allowed to talk about it, but the congregations are led to believe that these are real stained glass windows. Only the preists and the young men involved have known the ugly truth. Until now."
"Well, I definitely wasn't his first, that's for sure," said Boy X, a victim whose identity is being concealed for his own protection. "I was 17 at the time, working for the local stained glass installation company in my town, and we went over to install three new stained glass windows in the Sanctuary.
"Anyway, it was late when we got there, like 11 o'clock, and no one was around but the priest, and he said, How'd like like to have a little secret, just between you and me? - and then he told me that he wanted me to install fake stained glass instead of real stained glass.
"I told him that we could do that, but that it would look pretty much the same and that the cost savings would only be about 3 percent, so it really didn't make any sense," noted the boy. "But he told me to do it anyway. He told me not to tell anyone, but everytime I went to church and saw that fake glass, I knew. He was a monster."
"I really don't know how it started or why we did it," said Father Doe, who spoke with CAP News on the condition of anonymity. "It was really more of an 'inside joke' among us priests than anything else. You'd see priests from other churches at the golf course or out at a restaurant, and you'd both just give each other a little wink and a nod, like Yep, I did it, did you do it, because I did it. Sweet.
"We never really thought we were hurting anybody," added the priest.
As word of the scandal spreads, congregations around the country are calling for priests to pay out of their own pockets to have their windows retro-fitted with real stained glass. Sources say damages could soar into the hundreds of dollars.
"This goes beyond the local priests, beyond the leadership and the bishops here in the US, all the way to the top in Rome," said American News reporter Noah Hamm. "This is the type of thing that could take down the entire church."
"We really didn't need this right now," said Catholic Council spokesperson Andrew Doback. "I mean, installing fake stained glass windows under false pretenses is pretty much the worst thing our priests could do to these young men. It's really not the image we want our spiritual leaders to portray."
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