Catholic Evangelism in the New Millennium

After more than ten years of being a Catholic activist in Boston, I can say without exaggeration that every Catholic I know has a large pile of letters filled with meaningless platitudes from the Cardinal's administrators in response to our letters outlining error and scandal.

Some of us have large filing cabinets in our basements filled with the evidence of errors and scandal, our correspondence, correspondence other Catholics have sent us.

Ten years of sending letters and having meetings with Chancery employees has been a complete waste of time.  In fact, it has been worse than a complete waste of time.  It has been detrimental to the vocations of many faithful priests and lay people.  It is the same story all over the country.

There is no internal forum to stop the misuse and abuse of power, money the faith, the liturgy, our priests and our children.

As you know, here in Boston we are trying something new.

As the first part of a series of what should turn out to be a lively few months here in Boston, tune in to Boston Catholic Insider where an open letter to the presbyteral council (meeting tomorrow) has been posted.

Our driving purpose with the blog in putting certain topics out in the light of day is simply to expose verifiable facts and matters that most people objectively feel should be addressed or corrected so that we can build a stronger Catholic Church in Boston and continue the good works of the Church. We do not seek a “seat at the table” or “feel good” meetings to discuss these long-standing concerns with no commitment by the archdiocese to taking action.  Our hope with the blog was to give a voice to laity, donors, and the many outstanding priests and people faithfully serving the Archdiocese who are frustrated and fed up with the corruption, cronyism, and general direction of the Archdiocese. We also hope to serve as a temporary stop-gap while the Archdiocese works on implementing a credible whistleblower policy.

Based on  the overwhelming number of comments and suggestions we have received from lay people in the pews as well as people “inside” the Church (priests, archdiocesan employees, parish staff, and others close to the workings of the archdiocese), we feel these concerns should be addressed in an open, transparent way.

The observations, questions and answers sought in the open letter will blow you away.

 Just as J. Bryan Hehir and his cronies believe they are setting up something new and exciting for the future of the Church in America - in response, so do the thousands of Catholics behind the efforts of Catholic Bloggers in Boston.

Checkmate.

Boston Globe Article on Archdiocesan Ban on Boston Catholic Insider

 The Globe did a very fair and balanced article on the efforts to index what's going down in Boston and the Machiavellian response of diocesan luminaries.

Of note, is the duplicity in what Terry Donilon claims is their excuse for banning the blog.  In one breath, he says bloggers were 'spamming' employees with unwanted links to posts.  In the next breath, he indicates that so many employees were glued to the blogs, it was a "distraction".

You can't have it both ways.   Either employees were not interested and didnt want the links, or they wew clicking on the links and reading.

I'm putting up the link to the Globe story posted at Boston Catholic Insider.

An Open Letter to the Cardinal is also posted on the link.  

The Open Letter is a culmination of several concerns brought forward from Catholics (including volunteers,  priests, employees of the diocese.  Serious concerns (including a decent whistleblower policy) that have been obfuscated and dismissed in internal forums in the Catholic Church.

There are several people who are limiting their intellect to whether or not the archdiocese should block a website indexing conflicts of interest and cronyism.  Yet the response of banning and blocking is appalling because they're doing it instead of taking corrective action.

The diocese would like to keep the focus on whether or not an employer should ban a website so there will be no focus on what they are NOT doing - creating a forum where corruption can be reported without having the administration retaliate.

Catholic laity want a forum where corruption can be reported to people of  good will and have that corruption acted upon without fear they will be retaliated against.    In Cardinal O'Malley's absence/abandonment there is thuggery when wrongdoings are reported.

How do you think that works in a post sexual abuse scandal caused by not having a forum where corruption can be reported to people of good faith who would act upon it?

This problem should resonate with everyone. Every Catholic on any side of anything should be deeply concerned.  When one of their employees is hurting somebody else or Christ's Church, nobody should 'agree' that it is righteous to resort to banning bloggers who exhausted every effort internally to correct the problem.

The fact they are banning the website of people who have tried to hold them accountable to create the forum internally and have been rebuffed, is a distraction.   They are avoiding the recognition that the flaw which enabled pedophiles is still in full swing.     There is no forum to complain about an employee who is hurting somebody else.  Instead, the Chancery in Boston goes into attack mode.

You have got to check out the latest at Boston Catholic Insider!

"Undercover Diocese vs. Catholic Bloggers"


When you're done, head over to Deal Hudson's post and check out the spin left by the hooligans at the diocese in the comments section.

"cloaked in a veneer of facts that cast aspersions upon good people doing good works"

How lame.

Anyone want to to take a stab at cracking that code?

The diocese playing another round of "when you don't have facts, throw some poo at your detractors".

The financials lead to the conclusion that the Archdiocese is handing over more than 2 million a year for their PR machine and this is what they get in return.

Give me a break!


Readers strongly encouraged to pony up and  leave a response in the comments section over at Hudson's post.  Follow the link.

More Caritas Conflicts of Interest

I know this is hard to believe after this post, but there appears to be more conflicts of interest involved in the Caritas deal.

As one commenter put it, Hellooooooooo Martha?? Speak up dear, we can't hear you.

Speaking of comments, do note the link to the comments in Caritas Coinkydinks 2 from the commenter stating there is no whistleblower policy in the Archdiocese.

Hard to imagine isn't it.

One thing I am learning from all this is exactly how many priests and lay people across the archdiocese are scared silly to blow the whistle.

Since this was the problem to begin with, any notion that there has been real reform inside of the Catholic Church is a delusion of grandeur.

The (Breathtaking) Cronyism Under Cardinal O'Malley Series Continues at Boston Catholic Insider

I hope you've all signed up for a subscription to Boston Catholic Insider?

I've got to tell you that goal of putting all the material in one place to get a more accurate picture of what's going on under Cardinal O'Malley's watch is shocking. Even to me. The nepotism, the millions of dollars and the favors being dolled out by Hehir, Kaneb, McDonough and Connors at the Abington Savings Pastoral Center blows you away.

I got a voicemail message yesterday from a Boston priest who said "...and we thought the corruption under Michael James Curley was bad!"

We've had to increase the weekly Boston Blogger Conference call to three calls a week to process, brainstorm and network the information coming in.

Here's something to whet your appetite:

Saunders was hired in 2005 by a search committee headed by Fr. Bryan Hehir. Nobody had ever heard of Saunders before he was hired, and people familiar with the search inform us his name appeared from out of nowhere near the end of the process while qualified candidates tell us they were unable to get an interview. When his hiring was announced in mid-July of 2005, it was sufficiently controversial that the announcement article in The Pilot mentioned objections as well as a statement by Terry Donilon defending Saunders as being a strong candidate for the position. The highly experienced associate director for public policy at MCC and interim MCC director, Maria P, did apply for the job, but was rejected and took “early retirement.” Saunders previously worked as SVP and legislative counsel (meaning ‘lobbyist’) for the Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Rhode Island Credit Union Leagues, so it might be that banking industry experience was an important prerequisite to hiring by the archdiocese even as early as 2005, before the Abington Bank crew arrived.

Honest, honorable and spiritual priests and people have to watch their backs around this crew.

Stay tuned to the BHE and BCI.

Cronyism in the Boston Archdiocese

I must say that even I am blown away by the cronyism in the Archdiocese of Boston being unraveled by our friends at Boston Catholic Insider.

Jim McDonough and Ann Carter (formerly of Abington Savings) have stacked the Chancery with bank tellers and other former bank employees who have bupkis in the way of Catholic credentials or experience in the roles they were given.

What is McDonough's head bank teller doing as the Cardinal's Executive Secretary?   It' a fairly high-level admin job that would require a seasoned executive secretary and Catholic.

And, according to last night's weekly Boston Catholic blogger conference call, there is more to come.

Between the fiefdoms of Jack Connors and McDonough, it would be one heck of a power point presentation to put together how their cronies helicopter from one of their fiefdoms to the other.  

Don't these people have to sign a conflict of interest policy?