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Disgraced
Texas priest joins sect in Costa
Rica
By Evan Moore
Houston Chronicle
SAN ISIDRO DE GRECIA, Costa Rica —
It's a twisted trail that leads from
Texas to this Central American
village, and along it stretches the
strange and disturbing odyssey of
Father Alfredo Prado.
Prado's path is an errant one.
Stripped of his priestly authority by
the Oblate Fathers in Texas under
accusations of sexually molesting
children — which the 73-year-old
cleric vehemently denies — Prado now
has become a fugitive from his order
and the chief celebrant for a
reputedly violent doomsday cult in
Costa Rica.
Prado now is an embarrassment to the
Oblate Fathers in the United States
and an annoyance to church and
government officials in Costa Rica.
Since his arrival in Costa Rica in
January, his presence has pitted an
international child welfare
organization against the Catholic
Church, the Catholic Church against
the cult and the cult against just
about everyone.
At first glance, Alfredo Prado is
anything but imposing.
Short, stocky, aging, he regards his
visitors with what appears to be a
startled glare, until it becomes clear
that the gaze is the result of a form
of partial blindness known as macular
degeneration.
Seated in his quarters at the back of
the "sanctuary" in San
Isidro de Grecia, clothed in black
vestments, Prado gives every
appearance of being what he claims he
is — a priest.
Only one element seems askew: Prado's
new home is a cult compound, an
elongated strip of several acres on
which a large house and several
outbuildings house a handful of adults
and eight or 10 teen-age boys.
"I'm here because my Blessed
Mother asked me to come," Prado
said, referring to the Virgin Mary.
"She chose me to come here, and
I'm honored."
More than 30 years ago, he considered
himself honored to serve as pastor of
St. Timothy's Catholic Church in San
Antonio, where he was known as a
talented charismatic cleric, a man
with a doctorate in psychology, a
priest who sang, danced and performed
magic tricks for children.
That was long before the Oblate
Fatherhood stripped him of his
clerical authority in 1991, ostensibly
over theological differences, but,
according to Prado, accompanied by
accusations of child
molestation.
It was long before he was sent to a
church pedophile treatment center in
New Mexico in 1991, long before he
defied the church's orders to enter a
retirement home in Missouri last year
and long before he found his
"calling" more than 1,600
miles from St. Timothy's, in Costa
Rica.
Now, Prado has found a home in this
land of contradictions, a land in
which Costa Ricans legitimately boast
of magnificent vistas, then obscure
those views with massive security
walls.
Here, the legally blind septuagenarian
with a history of heart problems
drinks and dances at weddings he
performs with no priestly authority.
Here, in the country's Central Valley,
deep in the shadow of the Poas
Volcano, Prado has found a new home as
a "priest" and guest of the
Reina y Senora de Todo la Creado.
That sect, whose name translates to
"Queen and Lady of All
Creation," was formed as an
obscure group in 2000 by a self-styled
visionary, Juan Pablo Delgado.
Delgado, 25, who claims to receive and
relay messages from the Virgin Mary,
previously had been aligned with a
group with a similar name in Heredia,
a colonial town just north of San
Jose.
Both groups exalt "the
Virgin," a saint who occupies a
special position throughout heavily
Catholic Central America.
That position is even more exalted in
Costa Rica, where Mary is the
country's patron saint.
Nowhere is that position more evident
than in Cartago, about 15 miles
southeast of San Jose.
There, in the Basilica de Nuestra
Senora de Los Angeles, is a tiny black
stone figure of the Virgin, called
"La Negrita."
The figure, almost lost on a vast
ornate altar, is credited with
miracles.
On Sundays, lines of supplicants
extend far beyond the church out onto
an adjacent square.
Each year on Aug. 2, tens of thousands
make a pilgrimage — many of them
walking 50 miles or more — to pay
respect and pray to the figure.
It was in that social climate that
Delgado and the Heredia group's
founder, Eugenio Rodriguez, first
conducted their weekly sessions with
"the Virgin" in the late
1990s.
The pair argued in April 2000,
however, and Delgado left, borrowing
the name to begin his own cult.
Sometimes called "the Virgin
cult," Delgado's group developed
ties to Texas, specifically to San
Antonio and surrounding areas, where
several of its members reside.
It also has its own Web site, on which
Delgado's "messages" from
"the Virgin" are routinely
posted.
Among them are predictions that Pope
John Paul II soon will be assassinated
and that the world will end in the
final days of December.
"We think this group is
dangerous," said Bruce Harris,
director of Casa Alianza, an
international child welfare
organization.
"We've had several reports that
children are being sexually abused
there. Initially, there were several
boys who told others that they were
being molested, but we've never been
able to get them off the grounds to
talk to them."
Secretive and defensive, Delgado
refuses interviews.
Several teen-age boys working on the
grounds either refused to speak or
nervously declined, saying they did
not have "permission."
The size of the group's membership is
unknown, but it is elite. Members are
known to include lawyers, physicians,
engineers, teachers and now, Prado.
But, with Prado's arrival, it no
longer is obscure.
The priest's residency has brought
scrutiny on the group.
A San Antonio woman, a former
parishioner of Prado's who since has
joined the cult, enlisted Prado in
January to perform weddings, hear
confessions and preside over
funerals.
Prado, who already was at odds with
his order, said he readily accepted.
"I never had a moment of doubt,
no skepticism," Prado said.
"The Blessed Mother decreed that
I was already separated from the
Oblates, that they had no authority
over me.
"After the way the Oblates
treated me ... they accused me of
raping boys. Terrible degrading
accusations. I never raped anyone in
my life."
Ricardo Salinas said Prado raped him
in the 1960s, when he was 14 and Prado
was his priest.
Salinas, 50, said the assault occurred
in San Antonio in 1967, when he went
to Prado seeking advice about his
relationship with his father.
"My father physically brutalized
me as far back as I can
remember," Salinas said. "I
liked Father Prado. I thought he was a
safe haven for me.
"One evening, after a
particularly harsh argument with my
father, I went to the church to talk
to Father Prado. He invited me into
his private rooms and gave me a large
tumbler of brandy and told me to drink
it."
Later, when he was intoxicated,
Salinas said, Prado sexually assaulted
him.
"I remember him whispering, 'Sssh,
sssh. This will be our secret.'"
The following day, Salinas said, he
told his mother about the assault, but
she didn't believe him.
"She told me, 'Priests never do
such things,'" Salinas said.
In June 2002, Salinas wrote the
archdiocese in San Antonio, seeking
information about Prado.
The answer came from Father Patrick
Guidon, director of the Oblates there.
"I want to express my sincere
regrets for whatever inappropriate
conduct happened to you," Guidon
wrote. "I apologize sincerely for
any responsibility the Oblate
community bears for the pain you have
suffered . ...
"You asked if Alfredo Prado is
still alive. ... He is now in
retirement and is in poor health; he
is legally blind and suffers from
cardiovascular disease."
Prado said he doesn't remember Salinas
and said he had no sexual contact with
him, although he acknowledges he was
accused of assaulting Salinas and
others.
Harris said he learned of the
"Virgin cult" in early
summer, then began receiving more
calls about it in August.
Some of those were from Randall
Blanco, a North Carolina information
technologist whose nephews, ages 16
and 14, were placed in the group after
Blanco's brother joined the sect.
Blanco said he visited Costa Rica in
late August.
When he attempted to see his nephews
and inspect their living conditions at
the sanctuary, however, Delgado's
followers rebuffed him.
Later, he said, he was appalled to
learn that his older nephew was living
in the same quarters with Delgado.
Harris began calling various agencies
about the sect in September and said
the Oblate Fathers in San Antonio told
him that Prado had been disciplined
for child molestation.
Concerned that children were being
molested the cult, Harris contacted
the church in Costa Rica as well as
Rosalia Gil, Costa Rica's minister of
youth.
He said he also filed a complaint of
fraud against Prado and Delgado,
saying they falsely represented
themselves as priests, a crime in
Costa Rica.
"Unfortunately, without definite
proof that children are being molested
in that group, there's not much we can
do," said Gil, whose agency was
involved with the arrest of a child
sex-trade ring, another campaign by
Harris' organization.
"We are conducting an
investigation, but if they are there
with parental consent, we can't just
remove them. And we have no evidence
at this point that Alfredo Prado or
Delgado have molested
anyone."
That prompted Casa Alianza to seek
Prado's records from the Catholic
Church, Harris said.
Within weeks, four Costa Rican
Catholic bishops denounced the cult.
"But they knew about them before
I ever called them," Harris
said.
"And, if they have information
that Prado is a child molester as they
said, they should produce it, rather
than just disassociate themselves from
him and allow him to remain in
proximity to several young boys in
that group."
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