Saturday, June 12, 2010

"No Cash Until We See the Teachings of the Church"

The foundation made of straw is collapsing.

One Third of Parishes are operating in the red.

We simply must get a diocesan campaign going that completely shuts off the cash into the Cardinal's coffers.

Every time something comes up like the Cardinal's "Committee" to Snuff Out the Teachings of the Church in Catholic Education, we could send ransom notes to send into the Cardinal's Appeal saying they can have their money back when we see the teachings of the Catholic Church, the whole teachings of the Catholic Church and nothing but the teachings of the Catholic Church.
 

Furthermore, the wizards in the Chancery are certainly not mathematicians, are they.

The report, released this afternoon, said the priest pension fund is currently $104 million underfunded, and the lay pension fund, which was fully funded in 2007, was only 75 percent funded.

But archdiocesan financial officers say the church's long-term financial situation has improved dramatically since Cardinal Sean P. O'Malley arrived in 2003 and the church was staring down a $15 million operating deficit.
HUH?

How can the man be improving the situation when he's gone from a 15 million dollar deficit to a 150 million dollar deficit and he's funding operation by siphoning from people's pensions?

Even if you can ration away that the diocese is 135 million more in the hole than when the Cardinal arrived here, is paying operating expenses with money belonging to people's pensions even legal?

Isn't this a violation of ERISA laws and a breach of fiduciary duty to, for instance, pay out 7 million dollars to mow lawns and pay electric and heating bills of closed Churches so squatters can hold nutty lay-led services that are not even Catholic?

We've simply got to let the diocese collapse by sending our money to authentic Catholic initiatives.




6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Along with a 2% decline in weekly collections, the Archdiocese's 2009financial report also reports a 2%decline in weekly attendance. Does this mean that weekly attendance fell by two percentage points from the last credibly-researched/published figures of 17.3% attendance in 2006 to match the previous lowpoint of about 15% in 2002? (Parish income from property sales and fundraising declined by an average of 13%.)

Jerry said...

"We've simply got to let the diocese collapse by sending our money to authentic Catholic initiatives."

It is, unfortunately, the only way. You cannot negotiate with terrorists and heretics.

Anonymous said...

This present time in Holy Mother Church is starting to make what happened in the sixties look good.

Veronica

Marie Tremblay said...

No Dogma, No Dollars - let that be the catch phrase.

Try copying Monopoly money with a picture of the Cardinal superimposed and drop these in the collection baskets.

That'll send a message.

Anonymous said...

Carol, Thought this would interest you: http://www.pewsitter.com/addons/news/view/35081/
It's about St. Francis Xavier in NYC participating in the NY Gay Pride parade. Did you see on Bryan Hehir Exposed someone said in the comments that the Paulist Center was flying a gay flag for the Boston parade day?

M

Anonymous said...

Just to be clear; the operating budget is the budget for day to day operations...it was running at a 15 million dollar deficit and now it is not, now it is balanced. The pension funds are different animals and even at their current deficit are still in better shape than they were and within the next year they should be level funded. So, your reaction, while funny, is a little off. Financially we are incrementally better off in 2010 than in 2003. Sorry to be the bearer of "bad" news but on this one you have to give the devil (sorry Cardinal Sean) his due.