Render Unto Rome_ The Secret Life of Money in the Catholic Church - Jason Berry [183]
Borré had lost patience with reformers back home who put dialogue with bishops high on their agenda. By his lights the lessons of the abuse crisis, which begat a financial crisis, were stunningly clear. Bishops were cynical to sweet notions of pluralism, of engaging laypeople, even rich ones, in meetings that posed even the remotest challenge to their control of money. Bishops had Finance Councils or advisory boards who operated in the pray, pay, obey mode, which meant avoiding questions like why don’t we have an audited financial statement, Bishop?
In several cities or dioceses with enclaves of affluent Catholics—Naples, Florida, and Rockville Centre, Long Island, for example—the bishops had banned Voice of the Faithful from meeting in any parish. Here was the face of power showing its fear of the truth. Although many pastors supported VOTF’s agenda, which called for financial transparency as a means of reform, a priest who disobeyed a bishop’s rule faced the loss of his parish, demotion to a marginal job, or losing his faculties, the approval one needed to say Mass, hear confession, minister the sacraments.
“The bishops have been raised in a Roman culture that is military in nature,” Patrick Wall, the Orange County canonist–turned–expert witness remarked. “They take a long view of history. Loyalty and faithfulness are rewarded. These men have been raised in the Latin tradition … This is all they have. The bishops don’t do battle like the Navy SEALs. They aren’t looking to bring everyone home.”1
From his years in the navy, Borré knew that a military culture needed a system of justice in order to maintain discipline and the allegiance of the governed. In the spring of 2009, Borré was closing in on five years’ voluntary work in trying to reverse the suppression orders of the nine vigil parishes in the Boston archdiocese. His strategy of flooding the Vatican with appeals had spread to distant cities as Borré traveled, meeting people with the same values who were trying to keep their churches open. Future-Church’s website posted information that went buzzing through a new spiritual network.
Looking beyond the dictatorial politics of the Vatican, Borré and Sister Chris Schenk hoped that civil judges in the various states would begin to weigh the Suppression orders that deprived people of their spiritual homes as a religious tradition that deserved its freedom, too.
A priest in Rome who was sympathetic to Borré’s efforts suggested he approach the Secretariat of State, and Monsignor Pietro Parolin, the undersecretary for relations with states. This should be done in writing. For several weeks Borré and Gullo collaborated on the letter, which melded the high formalism of the canon lawyer with the American agitator’s drumbeat of candor. The final product, dated April 7, 2009, covered eighteen single-spaced pages: a Request for Mediation, asking Monsignor Parolin for “the appropriate dicastery of the Holy See [to] instruct the Apostolic Signatura and the Congregation for the Clergy to suspend the reviews of American parishioners’ appeals against parish closings.” It included the names and dioceses of all the parish groups and their leaders.
The document quoted a 2004 address by the late pope, referred to as “John Paul the Great,” during a visit of American bishops:
The parish, in fact, is “pre-eminent among all the other communities in his Diocese for which the Bishop has primary responsibility; it is