The Faithful

We've been away a few days and there are countless things to discuss. Where to begin? We'll start here.

The primary order of business was bringing Fearless Maria to college. She is a student at Saint Louis University. She hasn't decided on a major yet, which seems wise inasmuch as she's only beginning her education tomorrow morning. SLU is a lot of things -- it's a mid-sized university with about 8,000 undergraduates. It's a Jesuit institution in a city with a large Catholic presence, but in a state that is part of the Bible Belt. It's a school that spends much of its time teaching its students practical things, with a heavy emphasis on STEM professions, especially in the medical field. It's an ambitious institution with a large endowment, north of a billion dollars, placing it in the top echelon of universities in the United States, although its renown does not match that of similar Catholic colleges such as Georgetown, Notre Dame, or Boston College. It lives in the considerable shadow of its neighbor five miles to the west, Washington University. It's a school that has benefited greatly from the pitched battles for students who seek to go to a top-echelon school, but fall just short for reasons that seem completely arbitrary. SLU lacks the glamor of Georgetown, but the substance of the education will be quite similar. It's also a long way from Minneapolis, every bit of nine hours by car. The city of St. Louis has its issues, but there are ample opportunities there. We are eager to see what happens in the next four years.

***

We returned to the Twin Cities on Friday and attended Mass at our home parish, St. Rose of Lima in Roseville. The presider at Mass was Archbishop Bernard Hebda, who was there to formally install our new pastor, Fr. Marc Paveglio. It was a lively Mass and it was a rare event to have the Archbishop in your house of worship. Hebda did not avoid the painful subject of clerical abuse, which continues to unfold. Many Catholics have turned away from the Church, but today's Gospel reading, from John 6, spoke directly to the question.

Many of Jesus' disciples who were listening said,

"This saying is hard; who can accept it?"

Since Jesus knew that his disciples were murmuring about this,

he said to them, "Does this shock you?

What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending

to where he was before? 

It is the spirit that gives life,

while the flesh is of no avail.

The words I have spoken to you are Spirit and life.

But there are some of you who do not believe."

Jesus knew from the beginning the ones who would not believe

and the one who would betray him. 

And he said,

"For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me

unless it is granted him by my Father."

As a result of this,

many of his disciples returned to their former way of life

and no longer accompanied him.

Jesus then said to the Twelve, "Do you also want to leave?" 

Simon Peter answered him, "Master, to whom shall we go? 

You have the words of eternal life. 

We have come to believe

and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God."

Emphasis mine. Archbishop Hebda reminded us that we face the same question that Peter had to answer. The Church has made it easy, too easy, for people to leave, to go elsewhere. My sense is many Catholics are not becoming mainline Protestants, either, but rather turning away from organized religion entirely and, too often, turning away from God. I do not mean to diminish the horror of what too many priests and their superiors did to their victims, but the greater sin these men bear is that of turning away the faithful through their actions. Hebda's challenge, which Fr. Paveglio also shares, is to help us face the continuing reckoning, while also ensuring we do not lose faith, that we do not turn away from the promise of eternal life.

And the challenge continues, as today's headlines suggest:

In an extraordinary 11-page written testament, a former apostolic nuncio to the United States has accused several senior prelates of complicity in covering up Archbishop Theodore McCarrick’s allegations of sexual abuse, and has claimed that Pope Francis knew about sanctions imposed on then-Cardinal McCarrick by Pope Benedict XVI but chose to repeal them.

Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, 77, who served as apostolic nuncio in Washington D.C. from 2011 to 2016, said that in the late 2000s, Benedict had “imposed on Cardinal McCarrick sanctions similar to those now imposed on him by Pope Francis” and that Viganò personally told Pope Francis about those sanctions in 2013.

Archbishop Viganò said in his written statement, simultaneously released to the Register and other media, (see full text below) that Pope Francis “continued to cover” for McCarrick and not only did he “not take into account the sanctions that Pope Benedict had imposed on him” but also made McCarrick “his trusted counselor.”  Viganò said that the former archbishop of Washington advised the Pope to appoint a number of bishops in the United States, including Cardinals Blase Cupich of Chicago and Joseph Tobin of Newark.

Archbishop Viganò, who said his “conscience dictates” that the truth be known as “the corruption has reached the very top of the Church’s hierarchy,” ended his testimony by calling on Pope Francis and all of those implicated in the cover up of Archbishop McCarrick’s abuse to resign.   

By the way, Cardinal Tobin, who has his own issues, replaced Archbishop Hebda, who had been in Newark before Pope Francis sent him to St. Paul-Minneapolis. But let's set that aside for the moment. The real question is this: what do we make of this sensational allegation? Francis, above all else, is supposed to be a reformer, but if Archbishop Viganò is correct, Francis is an active participant in the continuing scandal. And it also raises another question -- what other forces were at play when Benedict XVI stepped aside? 

I have struggled with Francis since he became Pope. In important ways, he's been helping us focus on first principles, especially the importance of joining faith and good works. But in other ways, he's muddied the waters. Discernment is a continuing activity for Catholics; it has to be, really, because unexamined faith withers away. 

***

I had planned to get to John McCain and the continuing Trump circus, but that's enough for this evening. We'll get back to that and more in the coming days.

Transitions

I don't often go to Mass twice on Sunday, but we did yesterday. We went to our normal (but not for long) 10 a.m. Mass at St. Rose for the farewell Mass of our parochial vicar, Fr. Jim, who will be taking over at a parish in Watertown that has been doing without a pastor for six months. We then went to Corpus Christi at 6 for the final Mass of Fr. Fitz, who is retiring.

The new pastor arrives today. His name is Fr. Marc and he arrives from Pax Christi in Eden Prairie. He's a young man, half the age of Fr. Fitz, and he now has the task of being pastor at the two parishes in Roseville, St. Rose and Corpus Christi. He comes highly recommended and we're grateful to have him, because sending a younger priest to St. Rose and Corpus Christi is a vote of confidence from the Archdiocese.

We have a shortage of priests in the Archdiocese. Until about 10 years ago, it was rare for one priest to be pastor of multiple parishes. We are members at St. Rose and have been for about 3 1/2 years now. We like St. Rose more than our previous parish, St. John the Baptist. We've never lived in Roseville but we've felt at home there. St. Rose is a suburban parish with an aging population, in keeping with Roseville generally. You see a lot of gray hair in the pews there and many of the members of the parish have been there for 40 or even 50 years. Corpus Christi is also in Roseville, but its history goes back to the St. Paul campus of the University of Minnesota. It's a significantly smaller parish and it is an oasis of calm just a half mile south of the madness of Rosedale. The congregation at Corpus Christi is perhaps a bit younger, but still aging.

People come to Roseville to shop and to dine, but you don't hear much about the city itself. It's easy to get on an expressway and never take a look at anything beyond the mall. Still, Roseville remains a good place to live and, like some of the other first-ring suburbs, may be ready for a renaissance. We're eager to find out.

Confirmation Day

Fearless Maria gets confirmed at the Cathedral of St. Paul:

Right in front of the bishop

If you've never been to the Cathedral of St. Paul, you really should visit it if you get a chance. It is a magnificent Beaux Arts structure that was completed just over a hundred years ago, mostly the product of the persistence of Archbishop John Ireland and the wallet of James J. Hill, the railroad magnate whose mansion home is down the street.

I've lived in the Twin Cities for over 23 years and I've only been to the Cathedral three times -- once for the ordination of a family friend, another as part of teaching a Boy Scout merit badge, and yesterday. As a symbol of the majesty of the Church, the Cathedral is unsurpassed, at least in the Midwest. It's a subjective judgment, but to my eye the Cathedral of St. Paul is a significantly more impressive structure than Holy Name Cathedral in Chicago. It certainly has a better location -- Holy Name Cathedral sits on Wabash Avenue and is part of the grid pattern of streets in the area, while the Cathedral in St. Paul has a commanding perch on top of Cathedral Hill.

Confirmation is a hugely important sacrament in the Catholic Church, as those who are confirmed are full members of the Church. The issue for many Catholics is that they don't take that membership as seriously as they ought to. Following Jesus means putting aside your own desires and listening to something other than the sirens of the larger world. It's never easy to do. In his homily, Bishop Cozzens spoke of his own challenges as a young person and how he struggled to hear God's voice. It's possible that someone in the group pictured above could have a religious vocation some day. It's a path not often chosen, but as we've seen throughout the past year, lay people within the Church play a large role in faith formation as well. The challenge in the bishop's message is to listen more closely and find the role God plays in our lives.

I was confirmed a long time ago, back in 1979. In those days, the practice in our diocese was that Bishop would come to your parish, instead of traveling to the cathedral. I'm glad that we go to the Cathedral now; it serves as a reminder of the glories of the past, along with the challenges ahead. We don't have to rehearse the many scandals that priests and other religious have caused and the tremendous pain involved; it is an ongoing challenge and represents a stain that is impossible to remove. We build cathedrals to celebrate glories of God. We emerge from the cathedrals to find a world where God is always present, but also a world where it is often difficult to see the hand of God or the workings of the Holy Spirit. Those who were confirmed yesterday face that challenge today. Those who love and support those who were confirmed have the same challenge.

The Process at St. Rose -- The Archbishop Visits

We had another meeting at our home parish, St. Rose of Lima, last evening, this time to discuss the potential return of our pastor, Fr. Robert Fitzpatrick, following his being cleared of the abuse charges against him. Our new Archbishop, Rev. Bernard Hebda, was there, along with our auxiliary bishop, Andrew Cozzens, and Tim O'Malley, who is in charge of the archdiocese's child safety standards, came to ask my fellow parishioners whether we want Fr. Fitz back, and to answer our questions. We also received more news about the investigation itself. A few brief notes:

• If anyone doubted that Fr. Fitz is a beloved figure at St. Rose, those doubts were utterly dispelled last night. By my count, about 25-30 people spoke at the meeting and not one raised an objection. I would imagine Fr. Fitz will be back soon.
• We learned a little bit more about the accusation. Apparently the accuser was at a parish where Fr. Fitzpatrick served in 1983, so it was possible that the accusation was true. Mr. O'Malley relayed an example of an accusation that wasn't deemed credible, in which a woman accused a dozen different priests of sexually assaulting her, all during a homily. The hangup for a lot of people, I think, was the term the archdiocese used in describing the accusation against Fr. Fitz, which was to call the accusation "credible." Credible has a specific legal meaning, but the connotation for most people is that credible suggests an element of truth to the accusation. When the archdiocese first learned of the accusation, they immediately contacted the St. Paul police to have the matter investigated, and the police didn't find any evidence of wrongdoing. The archdiocese then investigated the matter further and came to the same conclusion. In the end, "credible" isn't the right word to use. Plausible might be better.
• One of the reasons the matter was made public was that it would give other accusers a chance to come forward, since it's generally been the case that abusive priests have had multiple victims. No one else has leveled an accusation. That's an important consideration, I think.
• I asked Archbishop Hebda and the others about a potential succession plan for Fr. Fitz. While I concur with my fellow parishioners that Fr. Fitz ought to come back, he is now in his late sixties and is approaching retirement age. The pastor assignment he's had involves both St. Rose and our neighboring parish to the west, Corpus Christi. A lot of priests have to double up these days and while Fr. Fitz is still a pretty lively fellow, it's a lot of work running two parishes. I suggested that the archdiocese ought to look at appointing a parochial vicar to help Fr. Fitz now and potentially succeed him down the line. Bishop Cozzens said that the archdiocese "wasn't there yet," but that they will be looking at what happens with both parishes as part of the normal deliberations involved in moving priests from assignment to assignment within the archdiocese. You can't just pluck a priest off the tree, of course, but it will be another factor in the overall disposition of the case. My guess -- Fr. Fitz will be back, but he will be getting some help going forward beyond the rotation of retired priests who have assisted in the past.

The takeaway, at least for me, is that the Archdiocese is engaged in the issue in ways it wasn't under Hebda's predecessor, John Nienstedt. Administering to the needs of the individual parishes is an incredibly difficult balancing act, but I suspect we're in better hands now. That gives me hope for the future, not only at St. Rose but elsewhere.

The new archbishop

I'm surprised, but pleased:

The news Thursday that Acting Archbishop Bernard Hebda will become the permanent leader of the Twin Cities archdiocese came as a relief to area Catholics — and as a shock to Hebda and Vatican observers.

Hebda, who has been splitting his time between the Twin Cities and Newark, N.J., since Archbishop John Nienstedt resigned last June, will be installed officially May 13.

Archbishop Hebda came to my parish, St. Rose of Lima, early on after he'd been appointed as the interim replacement for Nienstedt. I was out of town that day, Mrs. D and the kids were there and they were impressed. The plan was that Hebda would return to Newark after the Vatican found a permanent replacement, but that has changed. Given the amount of trouble this archdiocese faces, I would wager that the Pope and his advisors figured that Hebda needed to be here.

Given the speed of events, Hebda said he had no master plan for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. However, he plans to work with clergy, staff and parishioners as he charts his path forward.

"Up to this point … my primary concern is to do no harm," Hebda said at a news conference Thursday morning at the Cathedral. "After May 13, [the day he is installed] it's going to be my responsibility to set a longer course."

It will be an interesting process to watch.

The Process at St. Rose -- Conclusion?

One of the more disheartening bits of news we had in 2015 was that our parish pastor, Fr. Robert Fitzpatrick, had been accused of sexual misconduct and was being removed from ministry. The Archdiocese promised a thorough investigation of the matter. Now we know the result:

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis has reinstated a priest who had been accused of sexually abusing a minor in the 1980s.

The Rev. Robert Fitzpatrick had been pastor at Corpus Christi and St. Rose of Lima churches in Roseville before the allegation surfaced in August. Fitzpatrick denied the allegation and went on voluntary leave.

In a statement Thursday, Archbishop Bernard Hebda says police closed the case based on a lack of evidence and the statute of limitations. He says the archdiocese conducted its own investigation. A ministerial review board concluded the allegation was unsubstantiated and recommended that Fitzpatrick be returned to ministry.

A few thoughts:

• It was pretty close to a universal belief at St. Rose that Fr. Fitz had to be innocent of the charges. While I can't say I know Fr. Fitz well, the allegation never made sense to me, either. 
• While I'm sure that everyone at St. Rose would love to have Fr. Fitz back right away, it's probably not going to be that simple. It's been six months and it's not as though priests are simply a widget one installs into a machine. While Fr. Fitz is a vibrant, energetic priest, running two parishes is complicated and he's also in his late 60s. I don't know what toll this ordeal has taken on him, but I'm certain it's been tough. If it were up to me, and it certainly isn't, I'd hope that the Archdiocese would return him to both St. Rose and Corpus Christi, but that it also would move a younger priest into position to learn from, and ultimately succeed, Fr. Fitz. 
• We were fortunate to have a wonderful, gentle priest serve St. Rose during this period. Rev. Jim Devorak has been unfailingly supportive of our parish and was a comforting presence for a congregation that needed comforting.
• We aren't likely to learn much more about how the process unfolded, because the Archdiocese has needed to be exceptionally careful in how it handled this case. We know essentially nothing about the accuser and that's just as well. I've always suspected the timing of the accusation related to the deadline for victims of priests to come forward, which more or less coincided with the initial announcement. It's possible that, if the accuser had hired Jeff Anderson or one of the other attorneys who have been litigating these cases, we might hear more, but I suspect if the Archdiocese feels comfortable in reinstating Fr. Fitz, there's not much of a case available. Frankly, I'd rather not hear any more about it. I will pray for the accuser, whoever he (or she) is.

We'll learn more in the coming days. I am happy for Fr. Fitz and for my parish. While we don't know what will happen just yet, we do know that the uncertainty is over. There's comfort in that.

The process at St. Rose - continued

Picking up on yesterday's post concerning the allegations against our pastor, some more considerations:

• St. Rose of Lima is not a wealthy parish, but it is not without resources. Having said that, the parish school has struggled in getting enough students. Like many Catholic parishes, you see a lot of gray hair in the pews at St. Rose. The parish school is about to celebrate its 75th anniversary, but there are concerns about the long-term viability of the school. Even if the allegations against Fr. Fitzpatrick are false, there will be repercussions in terms of attracting children to the school. This will be a definite challenge for the staff.
• Some commenters on the previous post were wondering about the identity of the accuser. We don't really know much about that. The archdiocese has to be quite circumspect about discussing any of these cases in a public forum. As the process goes forward, we'll likely learn more about the accuser.
• We don't know if the timing of the accusation is tied to the deadline for filing claims against the archdiocese in the bankruptcy proceedings. The deadline for new claims has now passed and the local lawyers, especially Jeff Anderson, were trolling like crazy for a month prior to the deadline. If you listened to the radio in your car on your commute in July, you likely heard Jeff Anderson talking about the deadline. It is possible that this accusation comes from that, but we don't know, because at this point the accuser has not come forward publicly. If that happens, we'll hear plenty about the case in the local media, which always takes Anderson's calls.
• What makes this case an additional challenge is that Fr. Fitzpatrick is the pastor at two parishes, St. Rose and Corpus Christi, a smaller congregation about a mile west of St. Rose. The two parishes work together a fair amount but they are separate and Corpus Christi will have a similar meeting with the archdiocese in a few weeks. 
• It's tough to know how this will play out. The archdiocese has to operate differently now and, given the problems of the past, that's a good thing. The Catholic Church has lost many, many people because of this ongoing scandal. While some have found shelter in Protestant congregations, too many Catholics of my generation no longer practice the faith. The Church has weathered plenty of other scandals over the past 2,000 years, and I suspect it will weather this one. In the meantime, the damage is immense.

The process at St. Rose

We went to a meeting at our parish, St. Rose of Lima, last night. The topic is the allegation lodged against our pastor, Fr. Robert Fitzpatrick, who has been accused of sexual misconduct with a minor that allegedly took place in the 1980s.

The auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, Andrew Cozzens, was there, along with Tim O'Malley, who is the Director of Ministerial Standards and Safe Environment. O'Malley is a former FBI man and judge. They covered, in general, the charges against Fr. Fitzpatrick and answered, to the extent they could, a variety of questions from the parishioners.

The challenge that Archdiocesan officials face is twofold -- how to ensure that the process is fair, and how to deal with the reality that the Archdiocese is going through bankruptcy. A few particulars:

• Since Fr. Fitzpatrick is pastor at two churches, St. Rose and nearby Corpus Christi, it was important to get another priest into position, serving as a canonical administrator. The new priest's name is Fr. Jim Devorak, who comes to the position after serving as a priest in the New Ulm Diocese, mostly in parishes in the southwestern part of Minnesota. 
• The investigation of Fr. Fitzpatrick has two tracks -- first, the criminal investigation, which falls to Ramsey County, and then the internal investigation that the archdiocese will conduct. The process could take a long time. If the county investigators believe a crime has been committed, then the question comes down to whether the statute of limitations has run. It is possible that the law enforcement officials will determine that the allegation is without merit as well. Given the high profile that abuse cases have, it's likely the criminal investigation will take place sooner than later. Since the allegations go back potentially 30 years or more, it's difficult to say how much time it will take.
• The archdiocesan process will follow the criminal investigation and involves a 12-person review board that includes two diocesan priests and 10 lay people.
• Some of the questions that the parishioners have can't be answered, at least not directly. The identity of the accuser and the potential of a civil lawsuit are things that the archdiocese can't discuss. And because the archdiocese is bankrupt, they have severe limitations in what they can do because all expenses end up getting scrutiny from the judges and trustees administering the bankruptcy, to say nothing of Jeff Anderson and the other attorneys who have been chasing the archdiocese for years.
• As I mentioned in my earlier post, we are relatively new to St. Rose, but it is evident that Fr. Fitzpatrick is much beloved. The sense you get from the parishioners is incredulity that their beloved pastor could have done such a thing. Based on my limited dealings with Fr. Fitzpatrick, it does seem implausible, but I would imagine similar accusations against other priests must have seemed implausible as well. We don't know what happened, or didn't happen, all those years ago.
• What's difficult about the process is that, for the moment, Fr. Fitzpatrick has to stand alone and apart from the archdiocese. Given the history, it has to be this way. There can be no possibility that the archdiocese is seen as harboring a potential fugitive priest. In some respects, Fr. Fitzpatrick is paying for the sins of others. It may not be fair, but that's how it is.
• Parishioners asked if they could take up a legal defense fund for Fr. Fitzpatrick. The bishop indicated that this could be done, but was hesitant to say more. He also discouraged the notion that the parish could take up a second collection at Mass for such a fund.

There's more to the story, but it will have to wait until tomorrow.

Say it ain't so

News you don't want to read about your pastor:

The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis has put a Roseville priest on leave after receiving what it is calling a credible allegation that he sexually abused a minor in the 1980s.

The Rev. Robert Fitzpatrick is pastor at Corpus Christi parish and St. Rose of Lima parish and school.

Interim Archbishop Bernard Hebda announced the decision on Thursday and says police have been notified.

We are parishioners at St. Rose of Lima -- we joined the parish earlier this year after we'd grown disenchanted with our previous parish. I can't say that I know Fr. Fitzpatrick well, but we really like him and the other priests at St. Rose. I had no inkling that he might have trouble in his past. Fr. Fitzpatrick is pastor at both parishes because, frankly, there aren't enough priests to go around these days. Corpus Christi is significantly smaller than St. Rose and probably not large enough to have a pastor, especially now, but it's also a vibrant community.

Father Fitz and the Archbishop

Fr. Fitzpatrick had invited Archbishop Hebda to come to St. Rose for the upcoming 75th annivesary celebration of the parish school. Hebda was unavailable that day, but he came to St. Rose earlier this month -- the picture I've posted is from the parish website. St. Rose was the first parish that Hebda has visited since he became the interim archbishop. Now, less than a month after he came to St. Rose, he has to take action against Fr. Fitzpatrick.

It's going to take a while for me to process this information. It's possible that the allegation, while credible, may turn out to be false. I hope it is. We are all sinners in need of God's forgiveness, which is why this scandal is so deleterious. I understand that the Church is much, much larger than any individual priest, but it has to rely on its priests to survive. And with every revelation of misconduct, people are drawn away from God, just when we need Him the most.