Posted on 07/20/2004 9:08:41 AM PDT by Salvation
>>Why would they inflate these numbers when they have to pay stewardship on them?<<
Not only that, but the Bishops have a good sense of how many communicants there are, and solid figures on the number of confirmations, first communions, marriages, and baptisms there are.
If you have a 300-seat church which is 50% filled over 6 masses, that's about 900 communicants. If you have 2,000 registered Catholics in your parish, your bishop will think you are doing quite well. If you have 6,000 registered Catholics in your parish, your bishop will wonder what the hell is wrong with your services that you drive everyone away.
Of course, that would only apply if the bishops gave a damn.
(All language is deliberate.)
"BUT my story is true in most of the neighborhoods in which white people in NYC fear to tread - which is most of them! "
Well, I think you just explained your own observations. Please do not think NYC is typical of America. By the way, people at this sight are well aware I have a very inhospitable attitude towards illegal aliens. I slam Bush regularly for selling America down the Rio, and trying to outflank the Democrats to the left on all language and immigratiuon issues. But I've moved from city to city (NY, Philly, Boston, DC) several times, and each time I do that, I plot out with pushpins on a street map the location of every violent crime. Hispanic neighborhoods are almost always quite safe.
>> Because they pay a "tax" to the diocese based upon the goss annual receipts of the parish, not based upon the number of active, enumerated parishioners! My friend - son't you get it yet: the priests LIE!!!!!<<
Thor, that is quite misleading at least in the dioceses of Boston, Rockville Center, Arlington and Washington. Most of what a parish pays to the diocese is partial renumeration for loans and expenses the diocese has approved for the parish (i.e., construction costs, etc.) These are not taxes, but are moneys the parishes owe the diocese. The parishes are legally obligated to pay their lenders, which happen to be the dioceses. The only way these moneys are not paid back are becuase the diocese will occasionally forgive loans to struggling parishes. Parishes that are closed are often parishes which dioceses are frequently loaning to and then forgiving the loans of.
The operation of the diocese is funded through annual and quarterly Bishop's appeals. While most dioceses try to come up with a formula for meeting targets to ensure fairness, these are merely targets. I'm sure meeting loan targets helps a bishop notice that a parish is being run well fiscally, and pastors are certainly pressured to meet their goals, but the parish does not "owe" the diocese the appeals.
The goals set by the appeals do certainly keep in mind how much the bishop expects the parish is capable of raising, and I can certainly imagine that a parish which is well in the black will have a higher target set than one which is far in the red; the dioceses often have a sense of income redistribution. But to descrobe it as a "percentage take" would imply that a parish keeping up with massive costs (flooding? roof replacement? exceptional ministries?) would be expected to pay more than one with fewer costs. The truth is usually the exact opposite.
sight=site. Seriesly!
I was responding to thor76's skepticism in the immediately previous post about what the assumptions and methodologies were behind the statistics reported in this article by pointing out that such skepticism about that kind of thing is a long-standing issue.
This MSNBC article seems to support the number of Catholics mentioned here.
**Of course, that would only apply if the bishops gave a [-----].**
And maybe some bishops do really care and do tell the truth. Can we really put them into one general category such as "non-caring" here?
>>I was responding to thor76's skepticism in the immediately previous post about what the assumptions and methodologies were behind the statistics reported in this article by pointing out that such skepticism about that kind of thing is a long-standing issue.<<
It read as if you were validating his skepticism.
There are very strong regional variations in Hispanic participation.
The largest part of Catholic growth is natural increase and native converts. 1 million Baptisms plus 175,000 converts minus about 450+ thousand deaths is about 700,000 new Catholics every year. Immigration provides only around 200 thousand new Catholics.
**Of course, that would only apply if the bishops gave a [-----].**
>>And maybe some bishops do really care and do tell the truth. Can we really put them into one general category such as "non-caring" here?<<
I suppose I could've said, "Of course that would only apply if each bishop gave a damn." I have little doubt that there are many atheists, anti-Christians, and worse in the episcopate*, but I do not mean to assert that the episcopate, as a whole, does not care about the flock; that assertion would be slanderous against the body of Christ.
(* You don't have to believe the wild-eyed stories about Cdl. Bernadin's alleged Satanism to see how hard he worked to destroy Catholicism. And I've seen much atheist doctrine pumped out of seminaries. Bishop Wcela of Rockville Center, for instance, denied the resurrection.)
Including illegal immigration, there probably are about 1.7 million immigrants per year. I doubt that immigrants are only 15% Catholic, given the countries that they are from.
Its relatively straightforward to compare total parish registration versus the census profile of the parish boundaries. In neighborhoods where one ethnicity predominates with 90% or more of the population, this makes it very easy to determine how many roughly of the dominant group are registered. My own archdiocese, Philadelphia, does this on their website. They also break down Parish registration by ethnicity.
See here:
http://www.archdiocese-phl.org/parishes/index.html
Pick an area then a Parish, then click on Census Report 2 under each Parish. For example, St. Hugh of Cluny, in the heart of the Barrio, has 3860 Hispanics registered, who represent just 32% of the total living in the Parish's boundaries.
If you add up the number of registered Hispanics in the city versus the number actually residing in the city, you will readily find it is but a small fraction of the total. (Of course, the same thing can frequently be said about other supposedly Catholic ethnic groups, such as the Irish.)
I agree with your comments about the jitterbug liturgies offered to blacks. I knew many blacks in Philadelphia who were of the High Church mindset, and they were almost all Episcopalian. The domination of the Irish around here hardly helps.
I will believe you if you assert there is such a thing as "interparish finance" in the New York (arch)diocese, but it is even only within the diocese itself, and not in the Rockville Center diocese, which falls under the NY archdiocese. What you describe may be a fairly unique circumstance, given the very drastic wealth discrepancies in NYC, and the fact that parishes in NYC cover such tiny geographic areas. (Manhattan has a population density four times any city or county outside New York in America.)
As for the diocese taking "the parish's" money, you talk like a Calvinist! Once that money is put in the collection basket, it is the diocese's. Parishes are not separate little corporations. Like any large organization, each division has its own budget and its own accounts and its own responsibilities, but the whole diocese is all, ultimately, one source.
So, yes, there's a building commission. And there should be. The diocese has every right to make sure its not going to have to bail out a parish which could not afford to pay the debts in incurs when it begins to build.
Your a bit of an expert on your parish's finances are you? Take a look at a diocesan budget. See where the money goes. Here in the Arlington diocese, the vast majority goes to... building new churches! Go find out who footed the bill for your parish's original church. Here's a hint: mission parishes don't have any capital.
If any priest is stealing money from his church, that is an obvous horrible scandal. But should a diocese be forced to redistribute monies among its branches er, parishes, that's not stealing.
Yes I am.
Why are you so negative about them?
Because I assoicate their Vatican II restoration and rise (along w/their mentor Priests) with the cheery dilution of the Faith.
But here are some Deacons I'm not negative about at all:
St. Stephen
One of the first deacons and the first Christian martyr; feast on 26 December.
In the Acts of the Apostles the name of St. Stephen occurs for the first time on the occasion of the appointment of the first deacons (Acts, vi, 5). Dissatisfaction concerning the distribution of alms from the community's fund having arisen in the Church, seven men were selected and specially ordained by the Apostles to take care of the temporal relief of the poorer members. Of these seven, Stephen, is the first mentioned and the best known.
Stephen's life previous to this appointment remains for us almost entirely in the dark. His name is Greek and suggests he was a Hellenist, i.e., one of those Jews who had been born in some foreign land and whose native tongue was Greek; however, according to a fifth century tradition, the name Stephanos was only a Greek equivalent for the Aramaic Kelil (Syr. kelila, crown), which may be the martyr's original name and was inscribed on a slab found in his tomb.
It seems that Stephen was not a proselyte, for the fact that Nicolas is the only one of the seven designated as such makes it almost certain that the others were Jews by birth.
His ministry as deacon appears to have been mostly among the Hellenist converts with whom the Apostles were at first less familiar; and the fact that the opposition he met with sprang up in the synagogues of the "Libertines" (probably the children of Jews taken captive to Rome by Pompey in 63 B. C. and freed hence the name Libertini), and "of the Cyrenians, and of the Alexandrians, and of them that were of Cilicia and Asia" shows that he usually preached among the Hellenist Jews.
Stephen's preaching so inflamed a crowd of devout Jews, they bore false witness against him claiming he had blasphemed against Moses and God. The angry mob brought him outside the city walls where he was stoned to death.
St. Lawrence
Martyr; died 10 August, 258.
St. Lawrence, one of the deacons of the Roman Church, was one of the victims of the persecution of Valerian in 258, like Pope Sixtus II and many other members of the Roman clergy.
At the beginning of the month of August, 258, the emperor issued an edict, commanding that all bishops, priests, and deacons should immediately be put to death.
This imperial command was immediately carried out in Rome. On 6 August Pope Sixtus II was apprehended in one of the catacombs. When Pope Sixtus II was led away to his death, he comforted Lawrence, who wished to share his martyrdom, by saying that he would follow him in three days.
The Emporer, knowing that Lawrence administered the treasure of the church, demanded that Lawrence produce the treasure. Lawrence told the Emporer it would take four days to collect the treasure. Four days later, When St. Lawrence was asked for the treasure, he brought forward the poor, among whom he had divided the treasure, in place of alms.
This so enraged the Emporer that he ordered Lawrence to be roasted slowly over a fire.
on the 10th of August of that same year, Lawrence, the last of the seven deacons, suffered a martyr's death by being slowly roasted on a gridiron.
St. Ephrem
St. Ephrem was born agt Nisibis, Mesopotamia in 306 A.D. He was baptized at 18 and served under St. James of Nisibis, became head of his school, and probably accompanied him to the Council of Nicea in 325 A.D. When Nisibis was ceded to the Persians by Emporer Jovian in 363, he took refuge in a cave near Edessa in Roman territory, and often preached to the Christian community there. He did most of his writing here. Tradition has it that he visited St. Basil in Caeserea in 370, and upon his return, helped to alleviate the rigors of the famine of 372-373, by distributing food and money to the stricken and poor. He died at Edessa on June 9, 373. Ephraem wrote volumously in Syriac on many themes drawing heavily on scriptural sources. He wrote against the heretics, especially the Gnostics. He was devoted to the Blessed Virgin (he is often invoked as a witness to the Immaculate Conception because of his absolute certainty of Mary's sinlessness). He was responsible in large measure for introducing hymns into public worship, and used them effectively in religious instruction. His works were translated into Greek, Armenian, and Latin. He is called the "Harp of the Holy Spirit", and in 1920 Pope Benedict XV declared him a Doctor of the Church. He is the only Syrian to be so honored.
St. Vincent of Saragossa
St. Vincent, the protmartyr of Spain, was a deacon of the 3rd century. Together with his bishop, Valerius of Saragossa, he was apprehended during a persecution of Dacian the governor of Spain. Valerius was banished but Vincent was subjected to fierce tortures because he refused to sacrifice to pagan gods, and surrender the sacred books of the Church. According to the details of his death, his flesh was pierced with iron hooks, he was bound upon a red hot gridiron, and roasted, then was cast into prison and laid on a floor strewn with broken pottery. But through it all his constancy remained unmoved (leading to his jailor's conversion). He survived until his friends were allowed to see him, and prepare a bed for him, upon which he died. He died on January 22, 304 A.D.
St. Benjamin
St. Benjamin was imprisoned for preaching Christianity during the persecution of Yezdigerd of Persia and his son Varanes. Benjamin was released at the intercession of the Emporer of Constantinople, who promised he would stop preaching. As soon as he was released he again began preaching, was arrested and tortured, and then was impaled when he refused to agree to stop his preaching if released again. He died on March 31, 421 A.D.
St. Euplius
On August 12, 304 A.D., during the persecution of Diocletian at Catania, in Sicily, a deacon named Euplius was brought to the governor's hall and staunchly professed his faith. With the Book of Gospels in his hand, he was called before the governor Calvisian and commanded to read from it. The saint read the passage: "Blest are they who suffer persecution for justice's sake, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven." Euplius then read the passage: "If anyone will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." Questioned by the governor as to what this meant, the youth replied: "It is the law of my Lord, which has been delivered to me." Calvisian asked: "By whom?" Euplius replied: "By Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God." With that, the governor ordered that he be led away to be tortured. At the height of his torment Euplius was asked if he still persisted in Christianity. The saintly youth answered: "What I said before, I say again: I am a Christian and I read the Sacred Scriptures." The governor realized that he would never give up his faith, and ordered him to be beheaded. St. Euplius died April 29, 304 A.D., praising God all the while.
Paragraphs are our frieds........please.
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