My home town is in desperate need of prayer this Christmas:

[hedgehog]

There used to be 3 parishes here:

Immaculate Conception, dominated by Father Brown, who resented the fact that his parish no longer included the territory of: Holy Family, a solid Vatican II parish, and St. Michael's, the Polish parish.

IC was a dying parish because Father Brown strangled any lay involvement for 40 years. As kids grew up and formed their own families, they migrated to Holy Family, a very vibrant parish with active ministries. St. Michael's was fading as the older folks died off.

Father S. grew up in IC parish, served at Holy Family for a while, then was on the fast rack to become bishop somewhere

Father Brown died, and a new pastor came in. Father S had a heart attack and was off the fast track. Meanwhile, Holy Family was merged with St. Michael's, and the next two pastors worked hard to keep both parishes going. Father W. was in the process of turning St. Michael's into the home of Latino immigrants while fending off the efforts of the bishop to close Holy Family /St.Michael's. With the election of Pope Benedict, Father W gave up on the Roman church and joined the Episcopalians. Father S was appointed to be in charge at Holy Family/St.Michael's, but not made pastor. Because of his past connections, people expected him to protect the parish.

For three years, the people of Holy Family /St. Michael's were led on a snipe hunt as they were instructed to work with the people of IC to figure out what the future of the parishes in our town should be. Quite frankly, we were all too dumb to see how we were being played. Father S made sure no open rebellion developed. It became increasingly clear through the process that the pastor at IC, Father A, was an ignorant, lazy fool with a grandiose self image. He managed to offend everyone, I mean everyone in town, from those who wanted a Latin Mass to those on the Far Left. More than one person accused him of being both a liar and a thief. Somehow Father A became our pastor without any of us being informed. Our parish staff members were fired since Father A decided that finances were too tight. Traditions such as the annual bazaar were trashed as Father A found them to be too much of a bother. These had been social events, ways for people to get together. Father A replaced them with a take-out barbecue designed to raise money. He hired someone to run the barbecue and lost money on the deal.

Well, the word came down, first St. Michael's was sold, then Holy Family was closed and put on the market. The plan was to run 1 parish with the income of the three parishes. Father A spent down the capital reserve of ICC redecorating the church and his office without fixing structural defects. Father S was on staff as an assistant.

Then the reckoning came. Some people went over to IC. Many went to other parishes, some just stopped going to Mass. Over the next six months, attendance fell of as more and more people found Father A's arrogance intolerable. People would attend Mass if Father S was on the altar, but literally got up and left if Father A was the celebrant. Instead of being flush, ICC was hemorrhaging money. The Bingo games became a vital source of income, but people who'd volunteered for years quietly went away and the games had to be canceled. Father A is now in the midst of a stewardship campaign trying to guilt people into donating money. Meanwhile, he brought in his own people to build a parish staff larger than the combined staffs of the former three parishes.

So, last week, after the parish Christmas cards went out, Father S was called down to the Chancery and informed he was no longer employed by ICC since ICC couldn't afford to pay him. Word is, he wasn't offered any other job. Nothing was said of this at Masses this weekend, but the rumor mill is in overdrive.

So, Father S, the home town boy is out on the street. Father A, who is barely tolerated by many people and actively disliked by many more, is left in charge. I've become a member of another parish 10 miles away and am enjoying a wonderful Advent, marred only by the knowledge that I won't be sharing Christmas with the people Ive known for almost 30 years and the fear of what will happen at ICC.

[hedgehog]

1. Update: word is going around now that the bishop summoned

Father A to the chancery today and informed him that Father S is to remain on-staff at least until July which is the traditional time for new assignments. Many from Holy Family have been writing and petitioning the bishop for months trying to get him to reverse a bad decision to close our parish. This is the first time he's overruled his subordinates.

[CBHagman]

2. Just reading your account in the original post...

...sickened me. Thanks for the follow-up; I'm glad to hear there are some stirrings of change and/or correction.

[hedgehog]

3. Consider my story a warning. The same kind of scenario is being

played out in just about every diocese in this country. Here in Syracuse, the three parishes that were closed by being merged with another parish were the largest African-American parish, the parish which was a home for former priests and for gays, and my own parish which is noted for being a Vatican II parish.

[hedgehog]

4. Update on the update- having spent the last three years

scolding us from the pulpit for not cheerfully obeying the bishop with regards to closing our parish, Fathe S is now urging people to write the bishop about the situation here!

[JNelson6563]

5. Help me out here.

I thought it was common practice for priests to be re-assigned every so often. We had a priest here in one of our parishes who was so beloved and had done such a fine job in making improvements that his first re-assignment was cancelled and he stayed on another 7 years (I think). He has since been transferred and, to the horror of many in our little whitebread conclave of a town, replaced with a black priest as pastor of the parish. I left the church and all religion before this last change but heard about it from Catholic friends.

Just wondering about the time thing and how your poor town seems to be stuck with this lousy priest for an eternity.

Julie

[hedgehog]

6. I just know what happens in Upstate New york and Ohio: the

priests get moved around every 5 or 7 years and occasionally are allowed to stay for two terms. It's a bad policy, IMO. It's a rare priest who gets to know the people of the parish. How many of us take our marriage vows standing in front of a relative stranger? What kind of counseling can a stranger offer in Confession/Penance/Reconciliation? Supposedly it's to keep the priest from taking over the parish. In reality, the priest ends up extra loyal to the chancery (after all, he could be given a shit assignment). Also, too many priests come in and scatter the parish staff and bring in their own people who follow them from parish to parish. It also provides a cover for moving problem priests before anything comes to light.

[47of74]

7. Here in Iowa

The priests are assigned to parishes for six year terms, and normally get two of these terms. I know a priest who received an extension on the end of his second term for one year because the parish had just replaced the old church building with a new one, so he was there a total of 13 years. Where I'm at now the priest has been there since 2002, so he'll probably be there until at least 2014.

It's not like the old days where priests would be at a place for a real long time. The parish I grew up in had a guy who was pastor for 42 years, from 1910 until his death in 1952. I belonged to one parish where one of their early pastors was there 38 years. I believe there was one parish where the guy had been there even longer than that.