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Debra Geileskey, founder of MMM, claims to have had visions of
Mary
By Chris Hook
Magnificat Meal Movement (MMM) founders Debra and Gordon Geileskey are being investigated by the Australian
Taxation Office (ATO), according to Brisbane’s Courier-Mail newspaper.
The newspaper says an ATO spokesperson has confirmed the investigation and said allegations of unconscionable conduct and criminal fraud
would be forwarded to the Australian Federal Police.
However, an ATO spokesperson told The Catholic Weekly that the ATO did not confirm investigations of individuals.
Queensland’s Office of Fair
Trading has also examined a cheap home loans scheme promoted by a business linked to Ms Geileskey. Advertisements boast a three per cent loan but borrowers are expected to pay a $300 joining fee plus annual
subscription fees.
Debra Geileskey founded the MMM as a devotional Marian group in Melbourne in 1990.
In 1993, following a disagreement with the local parish priest, she and husband Gordon moved to
Toowoomba, Queensland, and began to hold prayer groups and Saturday devotions under the MMM banner.
But after another falling out with a local priest, the pair moved to Helidon, a small town in the Toowoomba
diocese. The Geileskeys and another couple then bought an old convent behind the Catholic church.
Up to 50 families had moved into the area to join the MMM by 1999.
Ms Geileskey had left the local
parish by then and was holding devotional meetings exclusively at the old convent, renamed the Shrine of Mary.
The Bishop of Toowoomba, William Morris, established a commission in 1997 to investigate the
MMM, taking the findings – and MMM publications – to Rome.
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith warned that the evidence presented by Bishop Morris showed the MMM “constitutes a clear danger to a
good many people”.
Reports of the ATO and Fair Trading investigations come in the wake of revelations in January that Ms Geileskey had begun selling Herbalife, a herb-based slimming program.
Herbalife
is similar in structure to Amway in that a supplier – in this case Ms Geileskey – buys the product in bulk and then on-sells it at a profit to distributors. MMM members are expected to distribute the product.
Ms Geileskey has been raising money for many years for a proposed 7,000-seat basilica in Helidon. She has claimed God told her to build the basilica. Zoning approval has not yet been granted.
Wal Maggs, a
former MMM member who was the movement’s publications officer, says that members who are not willing to sell the Herbalife products are treated like “second-class citizens”.
Wal Maggs and his wife Beth
became involved with MMM in 1994 and moved to Helidon in 1996. Later their two married daughters joined them – a common practice among MMM families.
Mr Maggs said the attraction lay in the group’s devotional
meetings and joyful celebrations. It was very beautiful in the beginning,” Mr Maggs said.
“In a way they provided a lot of things parishes don’t provide. This was Fantasia, we had everything.”
And Ms
Geileskey is a charismatic figure who claims to have had visions of Our Lady. But as her claims became more extravagant, Wal and Beth Maggs became suspicious.
“We dropped out when it became apparent she was
losing the faith,” he said.
In 1999, the Maggs family took a two- week holiday away from Helidon, then returned in secrecy, changed the locks at home, changed their telephone number and resigned from the MMM.
Wal Maggs then wrote a letter of apology to Bishop Morris and began working on a book, An End Times Tragedy: the case against Debra Geileskey and the Magnificat Meal Movement.
Mr Maggs said he wrote
the book to alert people to the dangers of the MMM. He and his wife still have friends in the MMM whom they are trying to persuade to leave.
“We constantly try,” Mr Maggs said. “We don’t get very far. It’s
like chipping away at a mountain. But we are getting there.”
And Fr John Ryan, Heldon’s parish priest, warmly welcomes those families who do leave – about 22 so far – into the life of the parish.
Mr
Maggs said the experience has worked to deepen his faith and love of the Church. “It’s opened my eyes,” he said.
The MMM has attracted other media attention in recent times. The ABC’s Compass program is to
screen a documentary on the MMM on Sunday May 27.
Compass reporter Geoff Wood said: “Debra Geileskey could be described as the Pauline Hanson of the Australian Roman Catholic Church.
“She’s an arch
conservative and a renegade who has struck an emotional chord with a disenfranchised minority, unhappy with where the Church is headed.”
The program examines internal power struggles, various business
dealings and allegations that the MMM is essentially a cult.
Slaves of the Eucharist, Compass, ABC TV, 10.20pm Sunday, May 27. Copies of the Wal Maggs book, An End Times Tragedy: the Case
Against Debra Geileskey and the Magnificat Meal Movement, may be obtained by contacting Fr John Ryan, PO Box 38, Helidon, 4344.
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