What Next Bishop Cary, the Kool-Aid?

During the slow process of desegregation in Chicago, I saw remarkable responses from homeowners to their new and unwanted neighbors moving in next door to them.

Some homeowners built eight foot brick or cinder-block walls along their property lines.  Some had glass block windows installed on the “bad” side of their homes.  Guard dogs living in outdoor doghouses become popular.  My family and I had a neighbor who put up bars over their windows and had two new steel doors installed each with five deadbolts for each door.  A cloistered convent was less fortified from keeping the outside world out than our neighbors did for their house.

Over the past forty years, new owners of these properties have taken down these walls and have restored the homes and properties to their original states and the neighborhoods once again looks like their original selves.  

Over 60 years ago during the Allied stewardship of Germany after WWII, the Soviet controlled region of East Berlin became worried over the flow of doctors, lawyers, scientists and engineers fleeing East Berlin for the western sector.  To stop what was called back then as the “brain drain” from East Berlin, the communists erected the infamous Berlin Wall – not to keep people out, but to keep people in.

What has revived these images in my mind have been some phone calls from our new friends in Bend Oregon who are supporting the efforts being undertaken by the Evangelical Catholic Diocese of the Northwest – in union with the desires of the laity – to establish a new mission parish somewhere in the greater Bend area.  These phone calls have been to share with me the latest hyper-reactive responses by Bishop Liam Cary of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bake Oregon regarding the new parish of the Evangelical Catholic Church moving into the neighborhood.

As the days draw closer to the weekend of June 6^th, 2014, when I travel to visit Bend to discuss the new parish and to engage the good people in a Q&A about the Evangelical Catholic Church, Bishop Cary has begun erecting his own Berlin Wall to prevent anyone from his flock from leaving his jurisdiction to consider the jurisdiction of the Evangelical Catholic Church.

For those just joining in on this saga, let me take a moment to catch you up.

The Evangelical Catholic Church and its Diocese of the Northwest has accepted Father James Radloff, former priest of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bend, into our jurisdiction and is now a candidate for Clerical Incardination as a Priest within our Church.  The gruesome details for the reasons why Father Radloff has come to the Evangelical Catholic Church have been documented by Dan Morris-Young of the National Catholic Reporter.  I urge those who have not to read Mr. Morris-Young’s stories to consider doing so..

After Father Radloff’s resignation from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Baker, a significant number of individuals and families who Father Radloff has cared for over the years as their pastor have indicated their wishes for a new parish to be established by the Evangelical Catholic Church in the Bend community.  While Bishop Cary was happy to be rid of Father Radloff, he is not happy with the increasing loss of people and their wallets crossing the street to become part of the new parish community.

Now that everyone is caught up………

In responding to the ECC coming to his neighborhood, Bishop Cary is trumpeting in various keys that the only “true” church in which one can gain eternal salvation is the Roman Catholic Church.  In addition to his trumpet solo, Bishop Cary plans to bring into the score the Roman Catholic Code of Canon Law to outline the possible punishments for those may be tempted to cross the street to visit our parish.

So much for Cary’s fidelity to Vatican II.

Bishop Cary’s actions reminds me of the Stephen King mystery, “The Dome.”  As Cary drops his ecclesial dome over the Diocese of Baker does he sincerely believe this will bring an end to his paranoia over having a some of his people cross the street to the Evangelical Catholic Church?  Left unchecked, any form of paranoia or neurosis can result in more pronounced unhealthy behaviors - especially if nobody on Cary’s staff has the backbone to sit him down and talk some sense into him.  I am prepared to welcome Bishop Cary for a one-on-one visit during my visit to Bend.  Maybe he and I can work through his anger and fears about the Evangelical Catholic Church.  I respectfully want to say to Bishop Cary, "We are not your enemy.  Why choose to be ours?"

For the umpteenth time, the Evangelical Catholic Church is prohibited by policy and tradition from stealing anyone from their houses of worship. We believe that both jurisdictions can co-exist without any difficulties. Yet Cary is fortifying his boundaries in preparation for an all out invasion by an Army of Satan.  Unless he is offered some sound pastoral advice, what else might Bishop Cary considering doing?   The time has now come for this independently-produced drama to come to an end before it brings more scandal to the Roman Catholic Episcopacy. 

My only warning would be to all of the good members of the many Roman Catholic parishes of the Diocese of Baker is this:  If you see deliveries trucks bringing Kool-Aid to your parish, avoid the Chalice at the next Mass.