OUT OF CONTROL

There are very few so foolish that they had not rather govern themselves than be governed by others. Hobbes

In 2017, liberty's blessings will rain down upon any cult chapel that hands Wee Dan and Big Don their walking papers: freedom from endless fundraising; freedom from the money-motivated una-cum boogeyman; freedom from sectarian strife hatched by greedy troublemakers; and freedom from hypocrisy. But these four freedoms, precious as they may be, are as nothing in comparison with 

FREEDOM FROM THE CULT BIG SHOTS' UNCHECKED  MANIA TO CONTROL EVERYTHING.

Letting "One Hand," Tradzilla, or their surrogates run your chapel is to (1) surrender its assets to the  civil corporations they and their cronies operate and (2) simultaneously invite their sharp-elbowed intrusion into your intimate, private affairs. Unless you belong to one of the wealthy, élite clans, then no detail of your life will escape their uncontrollable drive to regulate. The friends with whom the faithful may associate, one's choice of clothing and footwear, the children's upbringing, kids' career choices, a wife's rôle in household decision-making, everyone's political opinions, a family's choice of entertainment or swimming companions, and a multitude of other unspeakable encroachments are all fair game for their unbridled meddling.

What's yours is fated to be theirs; we imagine they resent your keeping any of your family treasure.

Perhaps if these men were bona-fide Catholic clergy, some of these infringements on privacy might be tolerated (to be sure, at a more restrained degree of invasiveness): real Catholic priests formed in approved seminaries are sensitive to boundaries. However, the truth is, the Tradistani ecclesiastical buccaneers are not Catholic clergy at all. In search of booty, they sail without an ecclesiastical mission the clannish main far outside the Church's territorial waters.

At their core, the cult masters are acquisitive totalists who brook no limits to their unrighteously arrogated authority over the people who affiliate with them. The chief means to preserve their brutal regime is religious terror, where the thought-terminating cliché "mortally sinful!" is supposed to silence anyone who objects to their tyranny. To extend their control, they weaponize the sacraments, while requiring their followers to lay aside their individual personalities and submit to the "clergy's" soul-killing interference.

Aside from their missing credentials and unholy intrusiveness, these factious busybodies are just plain contemptible. Every day brings fresh examples of pettifoggery and mean spirit. Ironically, it's often through their own efforts to tighten their grip over our minds and pocketbooks that we learn of their flaws. Take, for instance, this item from the "Bishop's (?) Corner" of January 8, 2017:

As Fr. McGuire wisely wrote in a recent St. Hugh Bulletin: 

The Heart of the Matter  

 If we let the liturgy mold us, forming our days and weeks and years, not dragging it into the turmoil of our superficial emotions, but letting it, gently and firmly, draw us into its own rhythm, then we will find in it a true school of Christian living, a source of wisdom and inspiration, and more and more we shall find that it is not just an interruption of the day, but its very heart.

As we interpret Dim-Bulb Dan's introduction, by choosing the verb "wrote," modified by the adverb "wisely," His Dominancy appears to suggest that Lurch himself authored the elegant meditation. That is to say, if Lurch had quoted the reflection, "One Hand," Sedelandia's  premier littérateur, would certainly have used a more accurate verb — with a different adverb as well — so as not to impute originality of authorship. Right?  For instance, something quite simple, say, "As Fr. McGuire appositely quoted in a recent St. Hugh Bulletin," would have telegraphed to all that the wise thoughts "One Hand" passed on to the Gerties belonged to someone other than his forlorn protégé.

But no, Deacon Dan typed "wisely wrote," so it's not unjustified to conclude he thought the sage observation came from Lurch's very own crayon. And, to be fair to His Errancy, if you consult the Wisconsin chapel's bulletin of 1-1-17 (click here), you'll find those gracefully cadenced lines printed without attribution just below the childish prose* of Lurch's Note from Father.

To be honest, if the Readers had seen St. Hugh's bulletin before reading the "Corner," like Dannie, we, too, would've inferred that Lurch had become the unexpected beneficiary of divinely infused wisdom (together with a mature writing style!). As every schoolboy and schoolgirl can tell you, the rules of civilized society require us to give credit to others if we use their words verbatim; in addition, clergy (even pretend "clergy") should be scrupulous with regard to others' property, especially others' intellectual property. We're sure you'll agree.

Being skeptics, however, when it comes to anything we get from the Wee One, the Readers found it impossible to believe cult "clergy" capable of such noble, well-crafted sentiments.  (That metaphor "true school of Christian living" is too fine a pearl to come from those swine.) Accordingly, we fired up our search engine and, as we'd expected, found 99% of the quotation here** — only this time, there appeared the following detailed attribution:

"Fr. Simon Tugwell, O.P. / Quoted In Magnificat, January 2011, Vol. 12, No. 11 p 265"

The credit to Fr. Tugwell, a prolific British writer and historian who last year celebrated his golden jubilee as a Dominican priest, certainly explains the lovely writing. (The Ohio cultists do have a habit of plundering Old Blighty, don't they? First the SLP Ordo Recitandi and now this.) What we can't explain is why Lurch himself didn't credit Fr. Tugwell in his bulletin. Two other bulletin features are attributed to their authors, so why didn't this fine snippet merit the same scrupulous attention? Was he frightened to cite a Novus-Ordo writer, no matter how orthodox the opinion? And if Lurch didn't know the writer's identity, as a matter of intellectual honesty he should have subjoined "author unknown." That way Grand Poobah Dan, who would've realized the lofty thoughts didn't originate in his underling, could have dodged PL's condemnation.

Of course, you can always argue it's simply a matter of the cult masters' habitual carelessness. No one meant to deceive anybody. As all TradWorld is aware, rite-trash "clerical" cult clowns haven't the "write" stuff to put together such expressive words. Dashing off his "Corner" in haste, Dannie was just trying to give his lackey a public "attaboy" in hopes the Gerties might soften their scorn for this much disparaged bumpkin.

Okay. We'll buy that. They're slouches, and everything in Tradistan is either propaganda or spin anyway, so who cares about persnickety niceties like avoiding plagiary? Yet, if that's true, then why should anyone allow these malformed slackers to have so much control over their personal lives?

Start the year off right. Break free of their baneful spider's web. Get control of these uncontrolled control-freaks. If your chapel is currently attached in any way to the SW-Ohio-Brooksville cabal, wipe that smirk of self-congratulation off the cult kingpins' overfed faces:

GIVE YOUR CULTMASTER HIS PINK SLIP TODAY!

*The Dale-Chall readability score for Lurch's awkwardly composed message is 6.14, meaning a 7th or 8th grader can understand it. The Dale-Chall readability score for Fr. Tugwell's writerly passage is 10.3, meaning it can be easily read by a college graduate. As you can see, Fr. Tugwell's penetrating insight was crying out for attribution.We'll leave it to others to explain why no credit was given.

**There is a difference of but one word: the linked webpage reads "Spiritual living," not "Christian living" as in Lurch's bulletin. If we had to guess, we'd say "Christian" is the original word, unless somebody thought one change was enough to evade the burden of attribution. Maybe someone can verify by checking the specific issue of "Magnificat."