Welcome
Come to the Stable/The Stephen Spalding Foundation is a 501(c)(3) non-profit charitable corporation registered with the
U.S. Internal Revenue Service and organized under the laws of the State of Minnesota. Our services are dedicated to survivors of childhood sexual molestation and adult victims of sexual violence. Our mission is to help each person who comes to us to recover from the personal trauma that they have suffered.
Come to the Stable/The Stephen Spalding Foundation now is poised to begin its development initiative. Please take a moment to review the PDF version of our Prospectus. Our PowerPoint Presentation offers additional insight into the issues that concern our organization.
Phase One of our business plan targets donors willing to fund our support staff over two- to five-year period. Phase Two will encompass a capital campaign to acquire property for the development of respite care facility.
We have targeted June 1, 2010, as the day we begin to service the needs of our constituency.
As our name implies, Come to the Stable is as much an invitation to join us on a journey of discovery and hope as it is a solicitation to help those in need.
The Stephen Spalding Foundation honors the memory of a classmate, a young boy whose fate has become an historical fact: Stephen Spalding (1953-1982) is the first-known reported victim of Anthony J. O'Connell. Criminal investigators have determined that O'Connell molested at least 30-50 students during his 25-year tenure as a teacher and the rector of St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Hannibal, Missouri.
O'Connell resigned in disgrace in 2002 as bishop (1998-2002) of Palm Beach, Florida, following a decade as bishop (1988-1998) of Knoxville, Tennessee. He was the protege of Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston. Cardinal Law sent his high school seminarians to St. Thomas when he was the bishop of Springfield-Cape Girardeau, Missouri.
O'Connell now resides at Mepkin Abbey near Charleston, South Carolina.
Come to the Stable/The Stephen Spalding Foundation has been established O'Connell survivors and their loved ones with the help of St. Thomas alumni and friends. The seed money that is nurturing our growth comes from a negotiated settlement with O'Connell and the Diocese of Jefferson City, Missouri.
We hope you will help us build a brighter future for those in need.
Michael Wegs
Secretary-Treasurer
Come to the Stable/The Stephen Spalding Foundation
Special Report: An Irish Tragedy: How Sex Abuse
by Irish Priests Helped Cripple the Catholic Church, published by Crossland Press, is an intriguing thesis about clergy sex abuse in the United States that focuses on St. Thomas Aquinas Prepartory Seminary and Bishop Anthony J. O'Connell.
Author Joe Rigert traces the rise and fall of O'Connell and his leadership at the high school seminary as well as the Diocese
of Jefferson City management team lead Bishop Michael F. McAuliffe and Bishop John R. Gaydos that allowed O'Connell to molest numerous students during his 25-year tenure at Hannibal,
Missouri, institution. In addition to the tragedy of St. Thomas, Rigert has crafted a stinging indictment of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland and how the Vatican prompted the transfer of Irish predophile priests to the United States where they have become the predominant figures in the history of child molestation in America. Rigert is an investigative reporter with with more 30-years of experience with the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.
Read Dr. Michael D. Fleming's commentary and other reviews about this tragic history.
Order your copy An Irish Tragedy today from Amazon.
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