Our Penance

Cream City Catholic
February 15, 2014

http://www.creamcitycatholic.com/2014/02/14/penance/

The Archdiocese of Milwaukee released its Plan of Reorganization to start closing out the bankruptcy process. I read the statement from Archbishop Listecki and I think this quote pretty much sums up the message for me.

The archdiocese has historically operated on a balanced budget, so the burden of paying off this debt will certainly be part of our penance.

What is so frustrating is that the Archdiocese has continuously imposed its poor leadership and decision-making on all of its members – this is our penance. Not only did those children suffer horrible abuses, but we will all be carrying the financial burden of this tragic disaster for years and years to come. Where do you think this money will come from? This restructuring announcement comes on the heels of the 2014 Stewardship Appeal, when we are all encouraged to give generously to the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. No doubt a lot of the money we give will go to paying back this debt. What is very sad to me is that the Catholic Church is responsible for so much good in Milwaukee, but at some point we can’t continue to blindly fund an institution on the premise of being faithful Catholics. It doesn’t make you or me a bad Catholic to question how the money is being spent. Frankly, I don’t trust the leadership to make those financial decisions anymore.

The Archdiocese of Milwaukee should have liquidated ALL of its non-essential assets and paid much more to the victims. This festering boil is only a symptom of the problems within the Archdiocese, starting with all of the Weakland-era initiatives and sympathizers. We can only guess at how much money was wasted during the decades-long Weakland reign on bogus projects, initiatives, horrible church “renovations”, pointless and overstaffed offices at the Cousins Center, and the list goes on.

Weakland claimed in his memoir that he had no understanding of the criminal nature of child sex abuse – that was obviously a CYA statement. And, of course, he was responsible for paying $450,000 out of Archdiocesan funds to silence a former male lover. How can we possibly allow his name to spoil the exterior of St. John’s Cathedral? It should be a priority to remove this extremely offensive display, especially for the sake of the victims of abuse and their families. Why do we allow his sympathizers and appointees to remain in power, acting as proxies to his vision? It seems one of the most obvious and FREE ways to heal this wound would be a full, open and decisive repudiation of and break from everything that the era of Weakland stood for – not just the scandals, but his errant ecclesiology as well. We could probably save a few bucks by firing his proxies too!

Archbishop Listecki is right. This is our penance, because we are all still suffering from a Weakland World in Milwaukee, and the leadership is failing to fix the real problems. Not to mention we are now the center of a national embarrassment. Maybe next time you consider donating, take your check right to Archbishop Listecki and have a frank conversation.