NEWS FLASH: NEW BOOK PUBLISHED BY THE LEGION
HOW MUCH ARE WE EXPECTED TO SWALLOW?
The Legion
of
Christ has just announced on their website that a new book, Christ
is My Life, which purports to be an interview with Marcial
Maciel is “…far and away the fastest-selling book in the Catholic
market today”
[http://www.legionariesofchrist.org/eng/articulos/articulo.phtml?se=91&ca=264&te=193&id=7902].
This claim is based on the fact
that Sophia
Institute Press has reportedly sold 21,000 copies of the book in just 9
days. The
number is deceiving. The truth of this matter is that, upon
contacting Sophia to print this book, the Legion of Christ ordered
and bought 16,000 copies for itself. If 21,000 are sold, that means
that only 5,000 others have been sold through Sophia Institute Press
itself. The Legion, however, asserts that: “In just nine days,
Sophia Institute Press has sold 21,000 copies of Christ is My
Life, its 304-page interview with 83-year-old Father
Marcial Maciel, LC,
the founder and director of the Legionaries
of Christ.” This is
a tactic widely used in the past by groups like the Scientologists,
who published a book called Dianetics, bought up thousands of
copies in-house, and thus boosted the groups popularity with the
public through the contrived multiple printings. The remainder have
been bought by families of Legionaries, and Regnum Christi members.
The
'interview'
itself is also a sham, since the alleged interviewer, Jesus Colina, is
not an independent journalist as they claim, but a Legionary employee
and RC member who heads up their news organization called Zenit. He
received the
material for the publication from the Legionary superiors as quotes
from the letters of the Legionaries’ founder, most of which are not
even authored by Maciel himself. His ghost writers have included many
Legionaries over the years, and most recently, priests such as
Gabriel Sotres and Gonzalo Miranda.
For more
insight into this book, see the REGAIN review here at Review of Christ My Life
There was no
need
to make such bold sales assertions, which only reveal the duplicity of
the
marketing techniques of this group. When will the Legion of Christ
simply tell the truth about matters such as this? An answer to this
question would make the publicity launch of this book in Chicago on
July 17th more respectable and allow the public to engage in the real
work of evangelization, rather than signing onto a public relations
campaign simply for the good of the Legion.
Their credibility is very much at stake here.