A Talk With The Bishop: Part 1

When it was my turn to speak during the question and answer session with Bishop Mark O'Connell, I asked for the microphone and said, "I have a lot to get off my chest but I will be respectful."  I then expressed the hope that we could all be respectful to each other no matter what our concerns were.

Without having any idea how I would say everything that was on my mind, the spirit seemed to move me.  I spoke with just a couple of pauses and touched upon most of my concerns.  The bishop listened intently and only added his thoughts a few times.  There were three topics that my discussion focused on: Catholic singles, the priest sex abuse scandal, and the hierarchy.

I started off by talking about my first parish, St. John's in Beverly and how that church's interior was needlessly renovated.  Spending money in frivolous ways was a pattern seen in a lot of parishes and I mentioned St. Mary of the Annunciation in the nearby town of Danvers.  That church spent a couple of million on so-called improvements that will do very little to bring young people to Mass.

I told everyone to take a look around the room and see how few young adults were here.  Then I wondered what would happen to this church in another couple of decades adding, "Am I going to be the only one sitting in these pews?" 

As a single person with a calling to be married, I said the Church did nothing for people like me.  The focus was on priestly vocations and not much else.  I mentioned how my priests ignored me after speaking to them about my desire to form a young adult group.  Then with a little bit of rage in my voice, I added, "And now I'm not even a young adult anymore.  I'm going to be 44 years old on Monday and I have never had a girlfriend.  Weekend after weekend goes by and I find myself alone."  Touching upon my college years at a very liberal school, I said defending Catholic values has only made me an outcast.

I told the bishop that the hierarchy came across as being out of touch.  When the Archdiocese of Boston first learned of sexually abusive priests, they should have put a stop to it immediately.  Instead the cover up and scandal drove many parishioners away.  When abuse victims protested outside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross, Cardinal Sean O'Malley should have spoken with them face to face instead of turning his back.  For all the talk of transparency and zero tolerance, we are still seeing people resign in disgust from the Church's own abuse commissions.

I said the Archdiocese's new collaborative plan wasn't really working.  At my former parish, collections went down because our new pastor was more administrator than shepherd.  The earlier wave of church closures had also driven many Catholics away in anger.  Those buildings may have needed to be closed but the cardinal could have met with parishioners one on one instead of being cold and arrogant.  Whenever the Church failed to act in a Christ-like manner, it ultimately hurt the faith.

I asked how the people in the pews were supposed to evangelize an increasingly skeptical public when the Archdiocese's own arrogance undermined us.  Even most of the nuns from my high school could have been friendlier but they chose to be mean instead and that makes people like me run in the other direction.  My talk concluded with one short statement that carried a lot of weight: "I have never felt so lost."

Since my primary concern was getting out all my frustrations, I think I only looked at the bishop once or twice.  Everything seemed to flow really well with one topic merging into another.  Now I waited to hear Bishop Mark O'Connell's response.