I was watching part of the USCCB conf. on tv a couple days ago and the Bishop of San Diego said that he had paid out “$80 some million” for abuse settlements thus far and still had to pay off “some $50 million more”. There’s plenty of money that can (and should be) earmarked for SCHOOLS.
No, that money is already earmarked. Also, that is either a legal settlement or a court ordered settlement, and as far as I know those will have timelines attached to them. You have to pay the $20 million this year for example, you can’t just take some of that and transfer it to the schools. At that point, your in breach of contract or breaching a court-order, which gets you nothing more than another round of charges, fines, lawsuits, and settlements. Then you have even less money than before.
There’s no point in complaining about settlement money. That’s already there and done. You can try and ask the court for an extension, but I have a feeling that you won’t get it. So, you have to pay it.
Your words stun me. I cannot understand how a teaching Brother in a Catholic school can feel so disconnected from the larger picture. How can the health of the Catholic school system not be a priority for you? Is this what you have been taught?
You still can’t ignore reality and economics and live in a fantasy world. The bigger picture is that there’s no money for the schools, therefore they have to be closed.
My first suggestion as to what you can do is to educate yourself regarding the agendas in the Church. You cannot work in isolation. By saying it does not affect you, you remind me of the people in Germany who, as Hitler’s men marched from town to town, said “that’s not my town”. Then one day, they came to their town.
By Goodwin’s Law, you’ve now lost the argument.
You’ve also compared a Religious Brother directly to Nazi-sypathysers, which also puts you in violation of forum rules (which Brother David posted a page back).
I consider it a great grace for the Church that the bishops are bishops and their critics are not.
Definitely.
I assume that everyone here tithes and donates generously (and regularly) to their local Catholic schools. That is what will make the difference. We can’t expect our bishops to do all the work themselves.
Exactly. Look, I support Catholics schools but I don’t live in NY (I don’t even live in the US). I’m sorry, but I’m not about to donate money. I’m not about to tell an Archbishop halfway across the continent how to run his diocese either (I’d never ever think about telling my archbishop how to run his diocese, or even tell the priests at the Catholic college here how to run it).
Brother David doesn’t live in NY. He’s a religious brother, which means that right now he’s right where he’s suppose to be. Who knows if his order even has a presence in NY. He’s in a school teaching right now, and that’s where his focus should be.
We don’t expect Benedictines to abandon their monasteries to serve the laity, nor do we expect the Franciscan Missionaries of the Eternal Word to get out and staff parishes 3 states away. They’re doing their work for the Church in whatever way they can, but they can’t fix all the ills of the world.
Brother David is simply recognizing the facts. There’s no point in moaning and yelling and complaining about it. This has been way over stated too; it’s not like they’re closing the entire system. A couple schools are closing so that the ones that are being kept can be maintained to a better level. It’s pretty much analogues to the closing of parishes in that we have too many, they’re underused and need massive maintenance. That’s just life, and since so many people here adore the free market system I’ll add that “It’s just good business”.
