That's right...make those sisters pay!!!

10/5/07

Today I sent a letter to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles voicing my opinion on its closing of a convent in order to sell the property to raise money for the settlement of sexual abuse cases. I have reproduced it below for readers of the Insightful Pontificator:

10/5/07

The Chicago Tribune today re-ran an article by Karl Vick of the Washington Post describing the plight of three Sisters of Bethany who live in a convent on Nopal Street in Santa Barbara. The sisters are being evicted so that the Archdiocese can sell the property (for a relative pittance of $700,000) to help pay for settlements in clergy sex abuse cases in the Diocese of Los Angeles.

Those who blindly follow the dictates of the Church and its episcopate might say that this story, as told by Mr. Vick, was just another heart-rending tale designed to denigrate our Church, or, as Father Ludo DeClippel, a diocesan priest quoted in the article might put it, to create “an (sic) hostile public opinion.” But despite the slant of the article, unless it is completely off-base, one cannot deny the facts:

--Priests, many priests, committed some abominable acts.
--The Archdiocese was, at the very least, lax in its supervision of these priests.
--The Archdiocese finally got called to account in the civil courts by victims and their supporters no longer cowed by the social, political, and financial power of the Church.
--The Archdiocese has arrogated (not too strong a word) the Nopal Street convent, leaving the Sisters who lived there out of their long time residence, despite their complete innocence in the aforementioned acts and their long years of service to the Church.

This leads faithful, but not quiescent, Catholics like my wife and I, to ask some questions:

--How many rectories have been sold and how many priests have been made homeless to help pay this settlement?
--Why isn’t Cardinal Mahony’s residence, surely a more opulent structure than the simple home occupied by these innocent sisters, being sold to help cover the costs of the settlement?
--Why, indeed, does Cardinal Mahony still have his job? Even in the increasingly unaccountable worlds of business and politics, anyone who presided over such a costly and shameful scandal would have been out of a job…quickly.
--Why are the sisters being forced to pay for the sins of the fathers?

You might counter this letter by saying these questions are too simplistic, but such claims are generally naked ruses for an inability, or a disinclination, to answer such questions. You might also counter by saying that I do not have what the lawyers would call “standing.” I don’t live in the LA Archdiocese, have never lived in the LA Archdiocese, and probably will never live in the LA Archdiocese. However, these problems, and these stupefying “solutions,” are not unique to LA. I am a lifelong Catholic, educated by Dominican Sisters and Jesuit Fathers. I attend Mass at least three times a week. I believe in the sacraments and most of the teachings of the Church. In fact, my belief that the Church is indeed Christ’s consecrated bride is reaffirmed by the Church’s having survived for 2,000 years, and especially over the last 20 or so, despite its vacuous, scrofulous, and solipsistic leadership. And, no, before you try to use this counter, I am not attacking John Paul II, though even he in his later years made some serious errors; note his treatment of the abominable Cardinal Law.

The Church is looking less and less like Christ’s representative on earth and more like a worldly institution desperately trying to defend its earthly prerogatives. It is getting harder to defend our Church and virtually impossible to convince non-Catholics that our Church has something that they could possibly want. Yes, I know that we have the sacraments, but the outsider considering a church has not yet bought in to the doctrine and the rituals that we as Catholics hold dear. He or she has to be attracted first. In order to keep existing Catholics in the Church, let alone attract new Catholics, our Church would be wise to follow, and to take warning from, St. Francis’s admonition to preach Christ’s word, using words if necessary. The Church is indeed preaching by its actions, but the preaching it is doing in the Nopal Street convent incident does not bear much resemblance to the good news of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.



Mark Quinn