NEWS
2002 NEWS STORIES
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ROAMIN' CATHOLIC
Contents © 2002
by Jim Holman.
All rights reserved.
NEWS
NOVEMBER 2002
CUTS IN ARCHDIOCESAN MINISTRIES have left some in "shock," others angry, according to reports in the Los Angeles Times and the National Catholic Reporter. According to an October 4 Reporter story, two archdiocesan department heads, Tom Chabolla, of the Secretariat for Pastoral and Community Services, and Sister of St. Joseph Suzanne Jabro of detention ministries (whose jobs were not in jeopardy) have resigned in protest. Departing employees, said the Reporter, have blamed the cuts in ministry on money paid out in clergy sex abuse settlements and anticipated costs in future settlements, on declining income from investments and on costs arising from the $190 million cathedral. Critics of the cathedral have warned that the costs associated with the cathedral would adversely affect archdiocesan ministries, though the archdiocese has consistently denied it.
Cardinal Mahony has denied that cathedral expenses have had anything to do with the ministry cuts and layoffs of archdiocesan employees. Rather, he has blamed a downturn in the stock market, which has devalued archdiocesan investments. The budget cuts have eliminated 60 jobs at archdiocesan headquarters and have laid the axe to ministries to black, Hispanic, Asian and Pacific Catholics, as well as to the ministry to "gay and lesbian" Catholics, Catholics with disabilities, to campus ministries, the ecumenical and inter-religious affairs office, the council of Catholic women, and the pro-life office. The department of religious education, too, has suffered some cutbacks. Staff in the detention ministries department have been cut by 50 percent, which means, said the Reporter, that only one priest will now serve the "Twin Towers" downtown jails. Before the cuts, said the Reporter, detention ministries offered 21 Masses and communion services in each of the towers.
MAHONY HAD NO CHOICE? According to the Los Angeles Times, the archdiocesan finance council's refusal to approve the 2003 budget (which contained a $4.3 million deficit) forced the cardinal to make staff and department cuts. According to canon law, archdiocesan spokesman Tod Tamberg told the Times, even the archbishop cannot override the finance council's decision. The staff and departments, it would seem, had to go.
Yet, according to the National Catholic Reporter, few other archdioceses, faced with budget cuts, are eliminating ministries entirely. New York has closed 11 ministerial offices and laid off 23 employees, but Cardinal Egan, said the Reporter, inherited a $20 million annual deficit from his predecessor, Cardinal John O'Connor. New York, however, projects no deficits for 2002-03, though it has been adversely affected by the stock market downturn. Boston, which faces massive clergy abuse lawsuits, has cut only 15 jobs and Miami has cut 16 jobs. San Francisco has cut its 2002-03 budget by seven percent, but has had no layoffs. Washington, Cincinnati and other archdioceses anticipate no cuts in ministries or layoffs.
IRATE CLERGY. Priests of the archdiocese of Los Angeles voiced their anger over cuts in ministries at a private meeting on October 7, according to an October 8 Los Angeles Times report. During the cardinal's annual presbyteral assembly with 600-700 priests, held in the new cathedral's conference center, priests disputed Mahony's assertion that the budget cuts had nothing to do with the $190 million cathedral project. The meeting was closed to the public and the press, though several priests spoke to the Times on condition of anonymity.
In a prepared statement (given to the Times) Monsignor Timothy Dyer of Nativity Church in South Los Angeles told Mahony, "it strains the credibility we have with our people when we dedicate a $189-million cathedral -- rejoicing that it is fully funded -- and, one week later, declare that 60 lay and religious employees must be let go because we have not planned wisely enough to raise the $4 million needed to fund their ministries to prisoners, ethnic minorities, gay and lesbian outreach, and religious education to children." Monsignor David O'Connell, pastor of St. Francis X. Cabrini church in South Los Angeles, said the cuts were made with little or no consultation with regional bishops, deaneries, or the laity. Two other groups of priests protested cuts in Hispanic and detention ministries. After the meeting, O'Connel said that Mahony offered rational responses to the priest, but "didn't feel the pain."
Priests who attended the meeting told the Times that the meeting marked a new era of assertiveness on the part of the priests toward the cardinal. Archdiocesan spokesman Tod Tamberg, however, said this was not so. Priests, he said, have long been "straightforward" with Mahony, who has always welcomed their comments.
OPPOSE WAR AGAINST IRAQ. A number of organizations, including the Catholic Pax Christi USA and the Lutheran Peace Fellowship, are sponsoring what they call the "Iraqi Pledge of Resistance" -- "a campaign to build a network of nationally-coordinated, nonviolent civil disobedience to oppose President Bush's plans for war on Iraq." The pledge of resistance, says the organization's website, http://peacepledge.org/, is modeled on one "that was used effectively in the 1980s to mobilize opposition to the U.S.-sponsored wars in Nicaragua and El Salvador." The organizers say that, in the "tradition of nonviolent resistance of Gandhi and King," they intend "through mass, coordinated nonviolent action, to create the conditions under which the public and members of Congress can recognize the terrible destructiveness, and immorality, of a war against Iraq." The organizers say they will use "the most powerful symbols that ordinary citizens have at our disposal: our own bodies, and, at least temporarily, our freedom."
Individuals and organizations may sign the pledge, specifying how they may want to participate in anti-war activism, including legal demonstrations and non-violent civil disobedience. One may access the pledge at http://peacepledge.org/.
Locally, one may participate in war demonstrations every Friday, 5-7 p.m., at the Westwood Federal Building, 11000 Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles.
PRAY FOR PEACE. Since "the international situation is heavy with tensions, including some explosive ones," said Pope John Paul II on September 30, the faithful should turn to the rosary. According to a September 30 Catholic World News report, the pope said the rosary is a prayer that helps bring peace to the world and hope to those who fear that "political efforts are of no avail." "I want to suggest, therefore," said the pope, "that people, families, and Christian communities pray the rosary."
CALIFORNIA IS "PERFECTLY POSITIONED to be a world leader" in the area of embryonic stem cell research, said Governor Gray Davis on Sunday, September 22, when he signed legislation that allows the use of state funds for such research. The new law not only permits the destruction of human embryos for research purposes but mandates that fertility clinics that perform in-vitro fertilization inform women that they can donate their discarded embryos to research. Davis also signed a bill that makes permanent a temporary law that forbids the use of human cloning for reproductive purposes.
Though President George W. Bush prohibited federal funding for research on new embryonic stem cells, the federal government has not outright banned the research.
CLONING IS A NEW FORM OF RACISM, Archbishop Renato Martino told the ad hoc committee at an international Convention Against the Reproductive Cloning of Human Beings, which met the week of September 22 in New York, according to a September 24 Zenit News report. "Here there is a risk of a new form of racism, for the development of these techniques could lead to the creation of a 'subcategory of human beings,' destined basically for the convenience of certain others," said the archbishop, who is the Vatican's permanent observer to the United Nations. Martino called for a worldwide ban on all forms of human cloning. "Human embryonic cloning must be prohibited in all cases regardless of the aims that are pursued," said the archbishop.
Noting that the Church is not opposed to scientific developments, Martino declared that "science itself points to other forms of therapeutic intervention which would not involve cloning or the use of embryonic cells, but rather would make use of stem cells taken from adults. This is the direction that research must follow if it wishes to respect the dignity of each and every human being, even at the embryonic stage."
WHICH WAY BUSH? According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Ari Fleischer, President Bush's press secretary, said of Bush's reaction to the news of California's embryonic research law, "the president has always said states have authority within their states." Later, said the Chronicle, "Fleischer amended his remarks. 'The president [said Fleicher] thinks that all policies -- state or federal -- need to promote a culture that respects life and, in that, he does differ from what California and the governor there have done."
Though, in the name of respect for life, President Bush has pulled U.S. contributions to the United Nation Population Fund because of its support of forced abortions, a September 20 Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute report said that, in his speech to the United Nations in mid September, Bush pledged to rejoin UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. The United States pulled out of UNESCO during the Reagan years because of the organization's alleged pro-Soviet slant and radical agenda. In a memo requested by the White House and State Department a year ago, Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute noted that UNESCO collaborated with the UN Population Fund and the International Planned Parenthood Federation. According to the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute, UNESCO, advocates reproductive health services for children, which include abortion.
TOO HOT TO SIGN. Facing strong opposition from persons appalled at the thought that foster parents of homosexual children could be liable for civil rights violations, Governor Gray Davis on September 30 quietly vetoed a bill that would have required foster parents of homosexual and "transgendered" children to undergo sensitivity training and would have forbidden "harassment" of such children (such as, perhaps, taking them to a church which teaches that homosexual acts are immoral).
The governor said that the state does not have the necessary resources to carry out the provisions of such a law. "The Department of Social Services' (DSS) resources are stretched too thin to ask the Department to take on a new priority outreach task at the same time we are making significant budget reductions and eliminating 7,000 positions in state government," the governor said in his veto statement. "In addition, the DSS already conducts outreach for gay and lesbian foster parents as part of its general foster care recruitment and this would have the unintended consequence of diluting the priority recruitment efforts on behalf of minority children who represent an overwhelming two-thirds of children in the child welfare system."
Randy Thomasson of the Campaign for California Families said that the governor's veto was "a tremendous victory for children and families. Despite Davis' terrible record of undermining marriage and family, he apparently decided that homosexual and transsexual foster care was too hot to handle in the midst of a tight race for governor."
NONE TOO HAPPY. The California Alliance for Pride and Equality said that they were not happy with the governor's veto. "We are extremely disappointed that the State of California has rejected a measure designed to protect some of its most vulnerable youth from continued discrimination and harassment," the Alliance's executive director Geoffrey Kors said in a press release. The bill, "which passed both houses of the Legislature, would have prohibited discrimination and harassment against foster youth, foster parents, other foster household members and staff based on a number of factors including sexual orientation, gender identity and HIV/AIDS status. Finally [the bill] would have directed the Office of the State Foster Care Ombudsperson to address complaints brought by LGBT youth regarding their care, placement and services."
Foster parents saw the bill as an attack on their freedom of religion and vowed not to take in foster children rather than give up their religious views.
The bill the governor vetoed "was a bold-faced attack on religious freedom," said Verne Teyler, executive director of Hosanna Homes, a private foster care agency. "This bill was unnecessary since foster youth who don't like the values of their foster parents can already request to be placed elsewhere."
A spokesman for Assemblywoman Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park), who sponsored the legislation, said that Chu was not sure if she would carry the legislation again next year.
CONGRESSIONAL PROPONENTS of the Abortion Non-Discrimination Act are "trying to hide behind the Vatican," said Democratic representative Louise Slaughter of New York, according to a September 25 Pro Life Infonet Weekly report. The act, passed by the House of Representatives on September 25, would protect the right of hospitals to decide not to provide abortions. The bill means to clarify a 1996 law that protects hospitals from performing abortions. Recently the law has been interpreted as protecting only medical residents in training.
In the House debate, no California representative spoke in favor of the bill. Several, however, spoke against it: Lynn Woolsey (D-Petaluma), Henry Waxman (D-Los Angeles), Lois Capps (D-Santa Barbara), and Juanita Millender McDonald (D-Carson).
In the final vote talley, among the 229 ayes were: Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley), Howard "Buck" McKeon (R-Santa Clarita), David Dreier (R-San Dimas), Edward Royce (R-Fullerton), Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands), Gary Miller (R-Diamond Bar), Ken Calvert (R-Corona), Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach), Christopher Cox (R-Newport), Darrell Issa (R-Vista), Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Del Mar), and Duncan Hunter (R-Alpine).
Among the 189 noes were: Calvin Dooley (D-Hanford), William Thomas (R-Bakersfield), Lois Capps (D-Santa Barbara), Brad Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks), Howard Berman (D-Valley Village), Adam Schiff (D-Burbank), Xavier Becerra (D-Los Angeles), Henry Waxman (D-Los Angeles), Hilda Solis (D-El Monte), Diane Watson (D-Los Angeles), Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-Los Angeles), Grace Napalitano (D-Norwalk), Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), Jane Harman (D-Venice), Juanita Millender-MacDonald (D-Carson), Stephen Horn (R-Long Beach), Joe Baca (D-Rialto), Mary Bono (R-Palm Springs), Loretta Sanchez (D-Santa Ana), Susan Davis (D-San Diego), and Bob Filner (D-San Diego).
BURBANK DEFENDS "JESUS CHRIST." The city of Burbank will appeal a September 9 California state appeals court ruling that the city council may not open meetings with prayers invoking a particular deity, according to a September 28 Burbank Leader report. The appeals court upheld a November 2000 lower court ruling that a prayer offered at a Burbank council meeting, in which a Mormon minister invoked the name of Jesus Christ, violated the First Amendment's establishment clause. The Burbank city council voted, 4-1, on Tuesday, September 24, to appeal the appeals court ruling to the state supreme court.
"We're seeking better guidance from the [California] supreme court, if we can get it," said city attorney Dennis Barlow. Barlow noted that at a city-sponsored September 11 memorial, a Muslim cleric referred to "Allah," but no one, said Barlow, objected. Barlow said that the case was not a religious freedom issue, since the city shows its neutrality by inviting ministers of various religions to offer invocations at council meetings. Rather, said Barlow, the case is a freedom of speech issue.
NO MORE BEANS. A new cathedral for the diocese of Orange will adjoin an upscale neighborhood, a public high school and a YMCA in Santa Ana, according to a September 8 Los Angeles Times report. On September 7, the Santa Ana city council approved the building of a luxury gated community, with 156 houses (each to cost over $600,000) on a 90-acre plot bordered by MacArthur Boulevard, Alton Avenue, Bear and Greenville Streets. The diocese of Orange has purchased 16 acres of this land for its new cathedral.
The 90-acre plot, near South Coast Plaza, is the last piece of farmland in Santa Ana. The land's lima bean crop will give way to what will be one of the most affluent neighborhoods in a city where 88 percent of the people make under $50,000 a year. The new high school will bear the name of the Segerstrom family, the owners of South Coast Plaza, who have owned the farmland since 1931. It is unknown what the diocese of Orange will name its new cathedral, nor have any plans for it been released. But its location is assured. As Bishop Tod Brown said (in June 2001), the new cathedral will rest "on the margins of our consumer culture."
"NOT CREDIBLE," said Fresno diocese bishop John Steinbock of accusations of sexual abuse brought against Father Eric Swearingen, pastor of Holy Spirit church in Woodward Park. According to an October 4 Fresno Bee report, Juan Rocha, 27, an army special forces sergeant stationed in Colorado, has alleged that Father Swearingen sexually abused him in the mid to late 1980s when Rocha was 10 to 14 years old. The alleged ongoing abuse occurred first in Bakersfield, then in Fresno, said Rocha. In April, when Bishop Steinbock received the allegations, he sent a full report immediately to law enforcement officials. Still, Steinbock believes the Rocha's allegations lack credibility and has not removed Swearingen from Holy Spirit church. Steinbock said he would suspend Swearingen only if presented with more credible evidence.
Rocha, who is married and says he has a 12 year old daughter, said the molestation began at Our Lady of Guadalupe church in Bakersfield. At the age 13, Roca ran away from home and ended up in Fresno. Applying for help at St. Alphonsus church in Fresno, Rocha claims he again met Swearingen, who had been transferred to the parish. "You can call it a coincidence," said Rocha. "It just happened. He was there." Rocha claims that he lived at St. Alphonsus with Swearingen for one year.
This is only the second molestation accusation involving the diocese of Fresno. The first involved a Hanford priest accused of raping a 16-year-old girl. The priest, however, was found innocent.
DOUBLECROSSED. Richard Kirby said he regrets helping Cardinal Mahony tell the public that the church was changing, according to an October 1 Los Angeles Times report. In July, Kirby had co-authored with the cardinal an opinion piece in the Times which advocated an "open and accountable" relationship between the archdiocese and abuse victims. Kirby said that, since July, he has been "depressed and disappointed by the cardinal's deceptions and my role in telling people the church was changing."
Kirby, 30, claims he had been molested between 1975 and 1977 by retired priest, Michael Wempe. In a lawsuit, Kirby claims that Mahony and the archdiocese conspired to conceal information about Wempe and used Kirby as part of their public relations campaign. Kirby is also asking Los Angeles County superior court to keep the archdiocese from collecting information from abuse victims for use in defense against future litigation.
THE ARCHDIOCESE OF LOS ANGELES, on September 30, issued a response to Kirby' s press conference, according to the October 4 Tidings, the organ of the archdiocese. "It is truly unfortunate that Richard Kirby and SNAP [Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests] have decided to slam the door shut on continued dialogue," said the statement. "We hope that they will reconsider the closed stance that they have taken. Nevertheless, Cardinal Roger Mahony and the Archdiocese of Los Angeles reaffirm a commitment to honest and sincere dialogue and assistance to victims of sexual abuse by clergy."
The statement repeated Mahony's claim that the archdiocese has long had zero tolerance for molesting clergy. "Since 1992," said the statement, "the archdiocese has had zero tolerance for priests who abuse minors. All allegations of sexual abuse are reported directly to civil authorities. A Clergy Misconduct Oversight Board with expanded lay membership and broad investigative authority is in place and meeting regularly. A 'Safeguard for Children' program to protect children from the variety of dangers they face today is now being presented to all 287 parishes in the archdiocese."
Yet, e-mail messages leaked last spring from the chancery office revealed that some abusive priests whom the archdiocese claimed were removed from parish ministry were actually assisting and resident in parishes. In 2000, Mahony settled for $1.3 million with two brothers who claimed they had been molested by Father Stephen Baker from 1984 to 1999. Mahony, who had known of Baker's proclivities since 1988, quietly retired the priest after the settlement. Another priest, Father Carl Sutphin, whom Mahony knew to be a molester, remained in the ministry throughout the '90s. Mahony said he believed psychological counseling had rehabilitated Sutphin.
THOUGH CARDINAL MAHONY has said that the priest shortage in the archdiocese of Los Angeles calls for greater lay involvement in the Church; and though, in 2000, the archdiocese ordained six men and in 2001, only two, the National Conference of Diocesan Vocation Directors bestowed its highest award on Sister Kathleen Bryant, interim directress for vocations in the archdiocese of Los Angeles. Sister Kathleen, who has worked for 16 years in the vocations office, received the conference's Paluch award on account of her "extensive contributions to vocation ministry" and for being a "lively, warm-hearted and innovative talent scout for God," said the September 27 National Catholic Reporter. The conference cited Sister Kathleen's three books on vocations (one soon to be published), her various articles, and her many addresses across the nation. At the convention, said the Reporter, "Sister Bryant offered a workshop that provided new vocation directors with insightful and useful tools with which to effectively work with aspirants discerning the priesthood and religious life, assessing their readiness for formation, and other very key elements of walking with an aspirant in his or her search for God's will in life."