Showdown in St. Louis

For those wondering what it might take to get swiftly laicized, this story from the NY Times yesterday seems revealing.  A parish in St. Louis has been sued by the archdiocese over control of its financial assets, but that’s not the half of it:

For more than a century, St. Stanislaus has enjoyed a rare role within the archdiocese. A lay board of directors governs the parish, and church property and financial assets are owned by the congregation. That relationship began to shift in 2003, when the archdiocese proposed that St. Stanislaus's property and assets "” then estimated at $8 million "” be brought under an archdiocese-managed trust.

Fearing the archbishop would close the parish and use its proceeds to combat the sexual-abuse scandal, the congregation balked. As negotiations dragged on, Archbishop Raymond L. Burke, arguing the parish was out of compliance with canon law, turned up the pressure on the church by removing its archdiocesan priests "” effectively denying communion to parishioners.

With its isolated congregation withering under censure, the board reached out to several archdiocesan priests who surreptitiously conducted Mass. Eventually, the congregation approached Mr. [Marek] Bozek, a young Polish-born priest from the neighboring Diocese of Springfield-Cape Girardeau.

In December of 2005, shortly after being asked to pastor the parish, Bozek and members of his congregation were declared schismatic by Archbishop Burke, who went on to become prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, “the church’s highest judicial authority,” in 2008.  Bozek was laicized by Pope Benedict last year.  The congregation just voted to reject a settlement deal with the archdiocese that would allow them to keep their assets but left no guarantees that the parish would stay open; it also stipulated, of course, that Bozek would be required to leave.

So… Renegade freedom fighters?  Pitiable and damnable schismatics?  Victims of episcopal and sacramental neglect?  Also, what grounds does the archdiocese have for suing the congregation, if the people own the land?

Updates and corrections: I have updated and corrected this post in light of the comments of Marcia Mann below, which I confirmed on the Archdiocese of St. Louis website.  What a mess!

In the 1840s, German trustees in Philadelphia fought with the bishop over ownership of parish property, with the courts ultimately deciding in favor of the bishops (or not to hear it?)

In the 1920s, the Polish National Catholic Church was formed by a number of parishes who were dissatisfied with episcopal oversight. Ecumenical relations have softened that schism, probably to the detriment of this St Louis situation.

These, and probably a few other, provide precedents for bishops and parishes to cite in legal battles. Very messy, but I suspect most of the law is on the bishop’s side.

If you are comparing the laicization of the priest with the accepting of a bishop’s resignation, let me assure you that these are very different things. Priests largely act as agents of the bishop, so if the bishop asks to laicize, that can happen sort of easily. Bishops receive “the fullness of orders”, so removing them is tricky; they have no technical superior, though the Pope can act that way at times.

That is why an earlier question on the Pope’s leadership is so problematic. If being a good leader means running the church in an autocratic fashion, firing bishops, laicizing them or even calling for their resignation, then the Pope is a lousy leader. If being a good leader means treating fellow bishops as equal, supporting their authority, then the Pope is a great leader — and we have bishops we cannot get rid of.

Property ownership and acquisition has always been the shame of the Church. Clearly the Vatican runs a materialistic church. Property is usually preferred rather than the gospel. Period.

Hi Jim,

I was actually thinking of the story that made the news a few months ago implicating then-Cardinal Ratzinger in failing to honor the request of both a priest and his bishop that the priest be laicized following his being convicted of abusing children. The priest had been convicted in 1978, his bishop requested laicization in 1981, and it was finally granted in 1987 (after having been refused in 1985).

Read it here: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/10/world/europe/10pope.html?hp

The laicization of Bozek seems swift in comparison, but this is no doubt due, in part, to the fact that Archbishop Burke, Bozek’s previous boss, was in charge of the matter in Rome.

A few degrees of separation:

The situation at St. Stan’s reminds me in some ways of the Hogan schism.

“In 1829 [Fr. Francis Patrick Kenrick] attended the Provincial Council of Baltimore as theologian to Bishop Flaget, and was appointed secretary to the assembly. There, among the other weighty subjects, had to be considered the distracted state of the Diocese of Philadelphia, then labouring under the troubles begotten of the Hogan schism. Hogan was an excommunicated priest, who persisted in celebrating Mass and administering the sacraments despite the interdict, and had a considerable following in the city.”

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08618a.htm

Later in the century, it would be Bishop Francis Kenrick’s younger brother, Bishop Peter Richard Kenrick, who would make the arrangement with the parishioners of St. Stanislaus.

“Under a land deed signed by Archbishop Peter Kenrick in 1891, the parish property was assigned to a corporation under a pastor and lay board members to be continually appointed by the Archbishop (cf. Deed and Charter & Bylaws of 1891).”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Stanislaus_Kostka_Church_(St._Louis,_Missouri)

(Notice, also in the wiki article, the visit to St. Stan’s by Cardinal Karol Wojtyla in 1969.)

If the property of St. Stan’s was ceded to a lay board to keep them from joining the PNCC, it worked for a time. Now that there is a large amount of money/assets ($8mm ??) involved, all bets were called off by Burke and now Carlson.

It’s your Holy Mother Church in action once again.

Hang in there, St. Stan’s!

Wikipedia: “Under Marek Bozek’s leadership the church, in a decaying St. Louis neighborhood, has grown to 500 despite 200 of the original parishioners leaving. Marek Bozek’s progressive views include allowing priests to marry and permitting women and homosexuals to be ordained. Transmogrification of the issues from property to doctrinal issues has alienated traditional parish members and attracted new progressive congregants.”

I remember reading about then Father Bozek and thinking that he was something of a loose canon. His laicization is, I bet, very easy to justify on doctrinal grounds.