MO--New clerics are asked to disinvite Finn

By Barbara Dorris
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests
April 29, 2015

http://www.snapnetwork.org/mo_new_clerics_are_asked_to_disinvite_finn

New clerics are asked to disinvite Finn

SNAP: “Or Finn should withdraw from ordinations”

Bishop’s role “hurts victims & Catholics,” group says

At least 2 KC priests are raising objections within hierarchy

Victims to Pope: “Pick a priest, not a bureaucrat” to head diocese permanently

WHAT

Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, clergy sex abuse victims and their supporters will

-- blast Bishop Robert Finn’s plan to preside at two upcoming church ceremonies and

-- disclose that two or three KC priests are objecting to Finn’s role in those events.

For the sake of healing and prevention, the victims will also urge

-- eight men who will become deacons next month to disinvite Finn,

-- Finn himself to voluntarily step aside from the events, and   

-- Pope Francis to name a parish priest, “not a headquarters bureaucrat” to permanently head the diocese.   

WHEN

Wednesday, April 29 at 2:30 p.m.

WHERE

Outside the KC Catholic diocesan chancery office/headquarters, 20 W. 9th Street in downtown Kansas City  

WHO

Two-three-four members of a self-help group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAPnetwork.org), including a St. Louis woman who is the organization’s long time outreach director

WHY

This week, it was disclosed that convicted Kansas City Bishop Robert Finn, despite his recent resignation, plans to preside over two ordination ceremonies for new deacons next month in Kansas City.

http://ncronline.org/news/faith-parish/despite-resignation-bishop-finn-will-preside-kansas-city-ordinations

http://www.hayspost.com/2015/04/28/despite-resignation-kc-bishop-to-preside-over-ordinations/

http://www.kctv5.com/story/28918664/resigned-bishop-finn-to-preside-over-ordinations-in-may

A former chancery (diocesan headquarters) employee has revealed to SNAP that at least two Kansas City Missouri priests have urged top church officials to stop this from happening. The priests drove recently to meet with and express their concerns to Missouri’s highest ranking Catholic official, Archbishop Robert Carlson of St. Louis.

SNAP supports their effort and opposes Finn’s continued active presence in Kansas City as “a distraction, detraction and disgrace” that will “dominate and mar these two events while rubbing salt into the already deep and still fresh wounds of hundreds of struggling abuse victims and thousands of betrayed Catholics.”

The group fears some may protest the ordinations, set for May 16 and May 28.

SNAP is urging the eight men who are set to become deacons in May to ask Finn to step aside and let someone else preside at the ceremonies. If they don’t, SNAP is urging Finn himself to agree to step aside. (There are roughly 446 active and retired bishops in the US who replace Finn at the ordinations, the group notes.) And SNAP is urging more parishioners and priests to “publicly denounce this unwise and unhealthy move.”

Kansas City’s next permanent bishop, SNAP says, should be “a parish priest with no chancery office or church headquarters.” They are urging Pope Francis to select a cleric “who has focused on service, not self-promotion or ladder-climbing or career-building.”

Two high ranking church officials – Pope Francis’ chief US aide, Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano (the “papal nuncio to the US in Washington DC) and Canadian Cardinal Marc Ouellet (the head of the Congregation for Bishops in Rome) – approved Finn’s leadership role in the ordinations.

http://kcur.org/post/archbishop-joseph-naumann-looks-heal-raise-funds-kansas-city-st-joseph-diocese