Spokane (WA) judge rules parishes, other assets available to abuse victims

[Nohome]

AlanFromWichita:

I don’t think politicians would have the stomach to allow an entire diocese to actually be sold off anyway.

Don’t underestimate the stomach of politians. People, Catholic and non-Catholic, are still REALLY upset about the sex scandal. If defending the Church is not politically convenient, politians will stay silent on the subject.

AlanFromWichita:

If they get away with it and do not have to sell their assets, I wonder whether that will “send a message” that it’s OK for the Church to behave this way then ditch out on victim payments.

I have faith that they will pay now in civil court and pay later when they stand before thier maker in judgement.

AlanFromWichita:

The gates of hell will never prevail against the Church, but is the Church still the Church without legal ownership of property?

I say yes and far stronger without the shackles of worldy concerns.

AlanFromWichita:

If we do end up seeing Church property going “out the window” toward these greedy people who tricked their priests into molesting them so they can capitalize off it, that’s just soreness from a needed surgical removal.

A very insightful comment. I hope those who think this is about greed will read and reread what you wrote.

Nohome

 

[AlanFromWichita]

JOHNYJ:

There is no Concordat between the USA and the Vatican.You think the U S Supreme court,if it accepts the case. Will allow Catholic church law to trump the Laws of the USA.Wake up ! if it was internal a dispute inside the Catholic church,maybe.
Can you imagine the Anti-Catholic reaction in the country that such a case will set off.

What makes you think the issue is about the law?

With activist courts and extreme legislative sensitivity to poll watching, I rather suspect the law will be used as a tool to reach a desired conclusion on most decisions of this magnitude, rather than a standard to apply to this case.

I guess we’ll see what happens.

 

[barnestormer]

Nohome:

Think of this as a one big weedout. Purge the Church and start over from scratch.

You’re right, it’s one big weed out: they’re opening the door to purging schools, parishes, cemeteries, and other properties from the diocese. Who needs those things, anyway??

Nohome:

It’s just bricks and mortar folks, the true church is within you.

Tell that to the hundreds of thousands of Catholics in that diocese (or even millions, going back to when it was founded) who put their sweat, time, talent, and treasure into building the parishes, the rectories, the schools, the playgrounds, the cemeteries. They—the rank and file—and their dollars built the infrastructure that’s there today. They did exactly what God and the Church asked of them: they gave and they gave and they gave, and now this is to be the legacy?

Destroying a diocese is not “justice” to those who have been harmed by abusive clergy. It’s the rather infantile “two wrongs make a right” approach.

 

[Nohome]

barnestormer:

They did exactly what God and the Church asked of them: they gave and they gave and they gave, and now this is to be the legacy?

Have some faith, God will provide to the needs of the faithful.

barnestormer:

Destroying a diocese is not “justice” to those who have been harmed by abusive clergy. It’s the rather infantile “two wrongs make a right” approach.

Your anger is justified, but I think it is misdirected. You need look no further than to the priests and bishops that allowed this to happen. They are the ones who have jepordized your investment.

Nohome

 

[barnestormer]

Nohome:

Have some faith, God will provide to the needs of the faithful.

God already has provided for their needs, by giving them what they have NOW!!!

Nohome:

You need look no further than to the priests and bishops that allowed this to happen. They are the ones who have jepordized your investment.

Congratulations on making my point for me. The bishops and priests are the ones responsible for the mess, so punish them, NOT THE DIOCESE’S LAITY.

Get this through your head: by making schools, parishes, etc., available for liquidation you are not punishing responsible parties. You are, rather, punishing those who are not responsible for the mess.

Help the victims heal by making more innocent victims???

 

[barnestormer]

Nohome:

Have some faith, God will provide to the needs of the faithful.

God has already provided for these faithful, by giving them what they have now. You and others are the ones proposing to take that away.

Nohome:

You need look no further than to the priests and bishops that allowed this to happen. They are the ones who have jepordized your investment.

Thanks for making my point for me. It’s the priests and bishops who are responsible, so hold them to account. Don’t punish the innocent diocesan laity (WHO ARE IN NO WAY RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS MESS) because they happen to be the ones who are attached to capital that they and their ancestors built up.

The laity happens to be the nearest deep pocket, so they should be targeted?? Your logic seems to indicate that we’re going to help the victims by making more victims. That doesn’t make much sense.

The real crime here is that the diocese could liquidate all of its parishes, schools, cemeteries, and lands, and give the money to the lawyers (whoops, I mean victims. Pardon the innocent mistake), and it still may not heal the damage.

This isn’t about healing. This is about blind vengeance.

 

[AlanFromWichita]

barnestormer:

You’re right, it’s one big weed out: they’re opening the door to purging schools, parishes, cemeteries, and other properties from the diocese. Who needs those things, anyway??

Tell that to the hundreds of thousands of Catholics in that diocese (or even millions, going back to when it was founded) who put their sweat, time, talent, and treasure into building the parishes, the rectories, the schools, the playgrounds, the cemeteries. They—the rank and file—and their dollars built the infrastructure that’s there today. They did exactly what God and the Church asked of them: they gave and they gave and they gave, and now this is to be the legacy?

Yes, it is too bad that the rank and file got messed up. Lucent, the company I used to work for went from 140,000 people to under 40,000 worldwide and their stock plunged from 80 dollars to 80 cents – right after I had moved my 401k into company stock. I am out on the street and my 401k worth squat because the people who ran Lucent did stupid things. Problem is, they still are so I’m not sure they benefitted from cutting us all out. Stuff happens. I’ve been crapped on by my “leaders.” These poor parishioners are victims, and I feel for them.

You are right that they all did What They Were Asked and their legacy is destroyed, at the hands of Church leadership. Justice has not been served, precisely because the leaders by and large will not feel the pain as the lay people will, at least in this lifetime.

That all said, the only thing that the government can take away are worldly, temporal possessions. If losing them means the end of their faith in God, then here’s what I think Christ might say about such things:

"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal. But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal.

If this makes people lose faith, then their treasures were in the wrong place.

Destroying a diocese is not “justice” to those who have been harmed by abusive clergy. It’s the rather infantile “two wrongs make a right” approach.

This has been going on for a very long time, and it would seem it took action this drastic for the Church to even act like it was trying to address the problem. It’s not like a priest made one mistake and a bunch of opportunist lawyers are taking the Church down.

I don’t like to see things lost, but apparently the Church did not see it as a big enough problem to work until it hit them in the pocketbook. If I were an outsider seeing all this, might I dare speculate that the Church leadership itself had been building up treasures in the wrong place?

Alan

 

[AlanFromWichita]

barnestormer:

God has already provided for these faithful, by giving them what they have now. You and others are the ones proposing to take that away.

No, I am proposing that the Church leadership is 100% responsible for it. Why should the Church be held to a lower legal standard than, say, Arthur Anderson?

Thanks for making my point for me. It’s the priests and bishops who are responsible, so hold them to account. Don’t punish the innocent diocesan laity (WHO ARE IN NO WAY RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS MESS) because they happen to be the ones who are attached to capital that they and their ancestors built up.

The innocent laity has always been at the mercy of the Church, as the laity has no say in Church goings-on except to the degree the leaders allow them.

What would you have us do? Do you think the victims of their abuse might want to watch them flogged, for example? Would that be therapeutic?

The laity happens to be the nearest deep pocket, so they should be targeted?? Your logic seems to indicate that we’re going to help the victims by making more victims. That doesn’t make much sense.

I see it more as preventing more victims. For decades nothing else would stop them from creating more victims; maybe this will. Which would you rather have, a building and an abused child, or no building and no abused child?

The real crime here is that the diocese could liquidate all of its parishes, schools, cemeteries, and lands, and give the money to the lawyers (whoops, I mean victims. Pardon the innocent mistake), and it still may not heal the damage.

You are right that a lot of money will undoubtedly go to lawyers instead of victims.

This isn’t about healing. This is about blind vengeance.

It might be partly about vengeance, and quite certainly opportunity on the part of some lawyers.

No, this won’t heal anything, but it very likely will result in fewer victims of the Church leaders. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say that since many of the ungodly decisions that were made over the years were by duly appointed and ordained officials, acting in their official capacity, then if we were to apply the standards to the Church was apply to a corporation, than the Church herself was guilty. The bishops involved were not just a few mavericks that the Church could not control; they acted with Church authority therefore they have profaned the Church and brought about guilt on her behalf.

If anybody needs prayers at this time, it is the bishops and cardinals that brought this situation about. The laity may suffer due to government action against the diocese, but those men will have to answer to God for their poor stewardship over assets He has given His people.

Alan

 

[barnestormer]

AlanFromWichita:

If losing them means the end of their faith in God, then here’s what I think Christ might say about such things…If this makes people lose faith, then their treasures were in the wrong place.

Nowhere did I say that this was the issue. Whether or not these people put too much stock in the brick and mortar aspect of the Church is in each of their hearts and not for you and I to judge.

But, ultimately, this point is irrelevant in our conversation. Nohome seems to be implying that it’s ok to take all of these assets and liquidate them for settlement $$. I don’t think it is ok. If it happens, well, there’s nothing any of us can do. As you say, fecal excrement happens. But I think it’s wrong to sit on the sidelines and say it’s ok or argue that this will help the furthering of justice. Neither of those is true.

 

[Ghosty]

I see it more as preventing more victims. For decades nothing else would stop them from creating more victims; maybe this will. Which would you rather have, a building and an abused child, or no building and no abused child?

For decades the number of victims has been in sharp decline. The problem was corrected long before the scandal broke. In most cases this is punishing parishes that weren’t involved, bishops that didn’t cover things up, and priests that never abused anyone.

Sometimes restitution can’t be had in this world, and I believe that many of these are such cases. It is an absolute perversion of justice to make parishoners suffer for the crimes of past priests, but it is not a perversion of justice to admit that the people responsible can’t be brought to justice when they can’t. Making people suffer for the crimes of others is always wrong.

Lock up the priests that did it, the bishops that covered it up when possible, take what little they do own, and let that be that. Putting a diocese on the auction block is absolutely disgusting.

Again, these are crimes that mostly happened long ago, not current ones. What exactly is your justification for potentially stripping away places of worship from God-loving people who are just as sickened by the abuse as anyone? The congregations were victims of the abuse too, their trust being grossly abused. Now we should strip them their churches? That hardly gets at the people responsible, many of whom have moved elsewhere. It only punishes the people who’s weekly tithes have kept those buildings running, many of them loyal friends and family members of the very people who were victimized in the first place.

Financial compensation is due, but it should not ever be extracted from the innocent. When due compensation is not available, it’s not available. There is no justice in this.

 

[JOHNYJ]

Not one bishop was punished by the church. Not even the 4 that the USCCB’s own panel said should be punished .Not even Cardinal Law, hes retired living in a Vila in Rome.
Catholics haven’t demanded these guys be punished and the bishops, sure won’t punish their own.
While prests are being dissmissed on the flimsyest evidence and we have zero tolerance.The bishops get a pass.Your upset about paying these judgements, go after the people that helped the pedophiles hurt as many children as some did.

 

[Catholic29]

Ghosty:

For decades the number of victims has been in sharp decline. The problem was corrected long before the scandal broke. In most cases this is punishing parishes that weren’t involved, bishops that didn’t cover things up, and priests that never abused anyone.

Sometimes restitution can’t be had in this world, and I believe that many of these are such cases. It is an absolute perversion of justice to make parishoners suffer for the crimes of past priests, but it is not a perversion of justice to admit that the people responsible can’t be brought to justice when they can’t. Making people suffer for the crimes of others is always wrong.

Lock up the priests that did it, the bishops that covered it up when possible, take what little they do own, and let that be that. Putting a diocese on the auction block is absolutely disgusting.

Again, these are crimes that mostly happened long ago, not current ones. What exactly is your justification for potentially stripping away places of worship from God-loving people who are just as sickened by the abuse as anyone? The congregations were victims of the abuse too, their trust being grossly abused. Now we should strip them their churches? That hardly gets at the people responsible, many of whom have moved elsewhere. It only punishes the people who’s weekly tithes have kept those buildings running, many of them loyal friends and family members of the very people who were victimized in the first place.

Financial compensation is due, but it should not ever be extracted from the innocent. When due compensation is not available, it’s not available. There is no justice in this.

Now this has to be the most inspired post I have ever read in these forums. Why punish the children for the sins of the fathers, when the vast majority of rank and file Catholics were never aware the abuse was taking place until the John Geoghan case broke in January 02?

Trust me, I feel just as much betrayed by our shepherds as anyone, but since the Catholic Church is not a democracy we can’t vote our bishops out.

With the perpetrators either dead or long gone out of ministry, I just can’t see how auctioning off churches will bring about any justice or healing for the victims, especially when it creates more victims.

 

[Catholic29]

I think this well spoken quote from a local Spokane area Catholic says it all.

Local Catholics News4 spoke with are upset and sad. Before the 11am mass at the Cathedral of our Lady Lourdes, a few Catholics said they understand the victims have suffered, but they don’t think they should too. One women says she does not want the current Catholic population to pay for sins that happened decades ago.

Rest of the story here kxly.com/common/getStory.asp?id=44871

 

[Nohome]

:Why punish the children for the sins of the fathers

If God can hold us accountable for the sins of Adam and Eve, man can do the same for debts to his brothers.

:Trust me, I feel just as much betrayed by our shepherds as anyone, but since the Catholic Church is not a democracy we can’t vote our bishops out.

You can vote with your wallet and your feet. Invest in another diocese or attend a different church. There is plenty that can be done.

:With the perpetrators either dead or long gone out of ministry, I just can’t see how auctioning off churches will bring about any justice or healing for the victims, especially when it creates more victims.

In all honesty, I do not see this happening for just the reason you stated. The victims won’t want to see churches close. Many are faithful members of the Church. But the court case is still a victory for them. It has gotten the attention of the clergy and it certainly prevents everyone here from forgetting the atrocious acts of the clergy.

Nohome

 

[barnestormer]

AlanFromWichita:

Why should the Church be held to a lower legal standard than, say, Arthur Anderson?

The Church should be held to a different legal standard than Arthur Andersen because according to U.S. law and the tax code, the Church is a non-profit tax-exempt organization, while Arthur Andersen is a business. While you may wish to hold the two at parity, the law sees it differently. You’re comparing apples and oranges.

 

[Brad]

Nohome:

Think of this as a one big weedout. Purge the Church of all that is evil and start over from scratch. It’s just bricks and mortar folks, the true church is within you.

I agree. I’d rather have no buildings and no dissent that the current state of affairs.

 

[barnestormer]

Brad:

I agree. I’d rather have no buildings and no dissent that the current state of affairs.

Well, you’re both assuming one will naturally follow the other. That’s a mighty dangerous gamble.

 

[Brad]

This decision is flatly OUTRAGEOUS.

We need to separate the immorality and sin of the guilty priests from the reality of this decision.

This is nothing more than blatant and explicit persecution of the Church and the innocent that have tythed their money for generations.

The Church is a not-for-profit institution. Can you imagine a judge saying it is ok to sell all the Red Cross buildings and fire all their employees so that all assets could go to victims of a few reckless employees? How about selling all assets of the United Way? Or… sell all mosques because some of the attendees supported the terrorism effort that resulted in the deaths of thousands?

THIS DECISION IS NOTHING MORE THAN BLATANT AND EXPLICIT CHURCH PERSECUTION.

It is allowed to continue to happen because good Christians do almost NOTHING to defend their church.

 

[Brad]

barnestormer:

Well, you’re both assuming one will naturally follow the other. That’s a mighty dangerous gamble.

I’m not assuming anything. I’m stating a preference. And I’m implying that I’m not sending good money after bad.

 

[Brad]

AlanFromWichita:

No, I am proposing that the Church leadership is 100% responsible for it. Why should the Church be held to a lower legal standard than, say, Arthur Anderson?

The innocent laity has always been at the mercy of the Church, as the laity has no say in Church goings-on except to the degree the leaders allow them.

Do you think all assets of the Red Cross should be sold if some employee engaged in homosexual activity with a teenager some 25 years ago?

Secondly, the innocent laity is far from innocent. The priest and Bishop is to set the moral standard for the diocese. They didn’t. That is the breakdown. Dissenting and immoral clerics. There is no rule by consensus in the Church. You are pushing for an incorrect solution to a grave problem. If the laity are innocent, let’s see some more laity calling the priests to greater conversion.