Let’s not get confused here
Monsignor Vella Gauci: this one has a secretary and personal assistant (state funded), while his uncle, also a monsignor, has a live-in ‘housekeeper’.
A couple of you have written in to say that it’s Monsignor Vella Gauci’s uncle, Monsignor Gauci, who has a girlfriend, and not him.
No, they both do. Except that at Monsignor Gauci’s great age, you can’t really speak of girlfriends but of companions. Either way, Monsignor Gauci the uncle has lived with a woman most of his life as a priest. She’s his housekeeper (her paid job was as a nurse in the X-ray department at Gozo General Hospital), just like Fabienne Grech is Monsignor Vella Gauci the nephew’s secretary and personal assistant.
Gozo is so…Gattopardesque.
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And Malta? Margaret, anyone?
“No, they both do.”
This is getting interesting. Could we have the full character list of ‘Clergy and Concubines of Calypso’? It’s a book that’s crying out to be written.
”Gattopardesque” is too flattering a term. I would use the words nittinin and ipokriti. The plus side is that at least they are into ”housekeepers” and ” personal assistants” and not family pets, farmyard fowl or children.
Impressive. Truly well informed.
[Daphne – Well, I do have the most excellent informants on Gozo.]
If you read his thesis you would know for sure that somebody else wrote it for him, just like JM.
Issa la l-Kurja taf, x’se taghmel?
Xi trida taghmel, Matt P – mhux tibqa siekta bhas-soltu?
Pero issa hemm Mons. Xuereb u nispera li jghid xi haga fuq dan il-Monsignore.
Xejn! Il-Kurja ilha taf b’dan it-tahwid u ma ghamlet xejn. Jaqghu dawk tal-Kujra ghandhom ghabthom jinten xi ftit iz-zejjed u allura ahjar jibqghu b’halqom maghluq?
You’re kidding right?
Priests with girlfriends don’t appear to offend the Gozitans, who don’t seem to frown upon it.
Some Gozitan priests have boyfriends, not girlfriends:
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20061021/local/palm-beach-authorities-name-gozitan-priest.37832#.UmkSJxRBvIU which was about this http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/19/washington/20foleycnd.html?pagewanted=print&_r=0 ?
Perhaps the monsignori take the Bill Clinton view: that they did not have sex with that woman.
Roman Catholic Priest Bérenger Saunière had a live-in housemaid, but he was French so that was OK.
look who surfaced in the Order, the ex-mayor of Zebbug: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=104240882967263&set=t.1721070537&type=3&theater
Meanwhile, in Germany….http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20131023/world/pope-banishes-germanys-luxury-bishop-from-his-diocese.491613#.Umi5CnBeMoM
I guess that is one more reason for the Maltese with girlfriends/ boyfriends on the side to keep flocking to Gozo. At the end of their stay in the isle of Calypso they can go to confession, as good Christians do, to either of the Monsignors Vella Gauci and for the sin of adultery they get a “mur u pprova tergax”.
Minn jaf xi queue (kju?) jkollhom ghall-qrar dawn iz-zewg nittinin bis-suttana.
People in Gozo have for decades suspected that Monsignor Gauci (the older man) never really wanted to become a priest and would have preferred to live a normal life, hence the X-ray department nurse, his identification with Mintoff, and the articles he used to write against the Church for Ix-Xewka, under a different name.
It seems to be the same with his nephew, the other monsignor, who instead of leaving the church, marrying Fabienne and pursuing a career in politics or UNESCO diplomacy in a secular manner, instead stays a priest and defies the church with his behaviour. What is the point of that.
I think the point, in their mind, is to exact vengeance from within as they are staunch Mintoffjani and fixated on the Interdett.
When Vella Gauci was removed as archpriest of Gozo cathedral, his relationship with Fabienne intensified in public as he had more reason to defy the church authorities and cared even less.
One would have thought that such people would rise above the guarantee of a secure pension plan.
Aren’t they grown men for goodness sake? If they don’t like the conditions they can leave.
Unless their ultimate objective IS to put spokes in the political wheel.
I do hope that the new non-nonsense Pope has “Malta, Malta and Gozo” in his sights.
Someone, somewhere, must have a decisive ethical voice. Locally, the situation is beyond dismal.
Which is why he’s just demoted the idea of Curia to interface. Autonomy subject to central audit and the practice of religion from an excuse for hierarchy to real work.
This pope doesn’t consider the vatican as a state removed from matters internal to individual fiefdoms. Things came to a head when Benedict found himself blocked from imposing his decisions on the grounds he’d be interefering in affairs of other states. Only to be accused of covering up for paedophiles.
To think Jimmy was fixing it all the time.
Meantime, the American episcopal church, if it is, flourished in Africa and Central America.
This pope may be just in time to expose the rot.
Perhaps il-Kurja can not do anything about personal lives, but surely can do something to hold these pseudo priests from saying Mass every morning.
What incredible hypocrisy.
Ghawdex f’dinja ghalihom. Omerta’, frodi fiscali, konkubinacc galore etc. Jien naf b’monsinjur iehor li barra li ghandu girlfriend, ghandu negozju mqabbat sew fit-turizmu tal-bahar u jahdem fieh hu direttament.
Perhaps he’s taking “fisher of men” a little too literally.
Gattopardesque? Perhaps. But more likely Manzonian. When Joe Vella Gauci was removed as archpriest, he took his case to the Vatican but didn’t get anywhere.
He caused a lot of trouble in the years he was archpriest of the Cathedral parish and fomented parochial rivalries which had died down considerably over the years. These rivalries have subsided since his removal.
His uncle had ambitions to become bishop of Gozo but was caught up in the fight between the Malta Labour Party and the Archbishop. The man touted to become successor of Bishop Pace was Joseph Mercieca but the Leone Band Club opposed his appointment ostensibly because he hails from the other band club (he also hails from a Nationalist family). Fra i due litiganti, Nikol Cauchi prevailed and Anton Gauci spent years on end writing against Nikol Cauchi, a truly loveable and simple pastor.
Joseph Mercieca was appointed archbishop of Malta some five years later, and Anton Gauci had even more reason to be frustrated.
He also wrote an autobiography, Ħwejjeġ li Rajna which was published by the D.O.I. in the eighties, probably the only autobiography ever published by the government Department of Information.
X’ipokrezija. Kemm jifthu halqhom jigru fuq l-omosesswalita.
U imbaghad Ghawdex, tahwid galore! God save their souls.
They should let these priests get married if they choose to do so or select married men or women for seminarians.
It is about time they enter the 21st century for their own good.
Who are Joe Vella Gauci and Anton Gauci?
The nephew and brother respectively of Monsignor Gauci, the present Vicar General of the Diocese of Gozo, who still sits on his ecclesiastical throne, like other monsignors, after many years and who aspired to be the successor of Bishop Nikol Cauchi.
Koss, qed nghid fi zmien gvern nazzjonalista l-isqof ta’ Ghawdex kien spiss jitkellem fuq in-nuqas ta’ investiment mil gvern favur ix-xoghol fil-gzira Ghawdxija. Issa ilna ma nisimu xi haga. Kien ikun aktar tajjeb li barra li jikteb cirkulari fuq dan is-sugett jikteb ukoll xi OHRAJN fuq li ghandek thallas lil Cesri. Ghax meta titla Ghawdex turist jew Malti u thallas xi farm house apartament jew tiehu servizz li jigi tiswik aktar min safra barra spiss tibqa minghajr ricevuta fiskali u hafna drabi ta’ weekend thallas hafna aktar milli jaqla persuna normali f’Malta. Forsi nesa Mons. Grech li mit taxxi jinholqu is-servizzi u l-investiment.
Archbishop Cremona should banish these monsignors.
Daphne, veru nammirak ghax dejjem tikteb il-verita. Hafna kitbu hawn fuq qassisin li ghandhom gharusa, ma naqbilx mal-omerta tal-kurja. Gravi aktar minn hekk hija l-problema tal-pedofelija fil-knisja ghawdxija, nissuggerilek li taghmel ftit homework fuq l-affari. L-isqof jaf b dan, pedofilu maghruf ghadu jgawdi ghax missieru kien mal-labour. Tkixxef ftit u taghtini ragun, l-isqof donnu dahal tesserat mal-labour. Tghid ghaliex mhu qed jghid xejn dwar il-gay marriage u l-adoptions? Thanks Daphne, i really admire you. Tkun ideja tajba li ttella pagna fuq dan is-suggett, l-omerta u l-ipokrizija fil-knisja ghawdxija tal-biza, ta min jizmaskera dan il-hmieg.