STEP XII OF XII: BEGIN GOOD GOVERNANCE

Months of no resources and zero cash-flow will break your priest's resistance. His bosses cannot afford to subsidize your chapel. (They need to keep every dime they can: it's traveling season, and they've lost many supporters.) Once the savings and operating accounts are depleted, there'll be no other choice but to throw in the towel. More than likely, the cult-masters will recall the priest, thinking they've left you in a lurch. However, if you followed our advice,  you'll have lined up a replacement and identified a new site for your Mass center.

The transition should be smooth as you begin to rebuild anew. Sure, you may lose the building and the furnishings, but that's a small price to pay for self-determination and freedom from grasping, domineering clergy. At least by starving the beast you'll have guaranteed that the creature doesn't have any of your ready cash left. The last thing you want is for your funds to pay for a fancy vacation to a luxurious New Mexico spa. Make them sell the property and auction off the contents to get their mad money. The brokerage and auctioneer's fees will at least keep some of the proceeds out of their greedy hands.

There is the possibility that your priest may decide not to go with his masters. He and his fellow lumpen clergy all harbor a deep resentment about the way they've been treated. They particularly chafe at how these Écône Caligulas attempt to control every aspect of their lives. (It's amazing just how granular the meddling is! You'd think those bishops had more important things worry about -- like the people's good and their salvation.) In their hearts, the priest-children know what's wrong. They openly share their misgivings among themselves and whisper their complaints to sympathetic laity. Therefore, there's a good chance that your priest might find it opportune to escape from the soul-killing trap he's in. If he has any sense of dignity as a man, he cannot wish to remain where he's miserable and subject to the manic whims and unpredictable outbursts of his control-obsessed masters. If he has any sense of self-interest, he'll see the clear advantage of working for a lay board and joyfully exercising his priestly duties, freed from the restless pursuit of filthy lucre and oddball demands from afar.

For this reason, right before the cult masters pull the plug in spite, the board should approach the priest with a sincere offer to remain as the chapel's contract pastor. (Click here for a model employment contract.) Assure him that under a lay board, he'll be treated like a man and a priest, and not as a backward child under overbearing bishops who want to regulate every detail of his life, private and public. He'll have the protection of his contract and the bylaws; he'll be independent for the first time since he entered the seminary; and, most important, he'll be able to develop spiritually. Furthermore,  if he's a "One-Hand" Dan product, by the board's insisting he undergo conditional ordination, he'll at last be relieved of nagging doubts about the validity of his orders.

That's a sweet deal. Anyone with an ounce of common sense will take it. We're betting your priest will. Even he sees the writing on the wall foretelling the end of chapels held ransom by grabby, ego-centric clergy. We bet your priest and his fellow completers are just waiting for the laity to come to their rescue.

Save them. Start with Step I tomorrow!

STEP XI OF XII: PREPARE FOR TAKEOVER

There are two central tasks the board must accomplish during the long months while the beast starves. The first is to establish a new non-profit corporation in your state and then apply for IRS  501(c)(3) status. Filing for state incorporation is relatively inexpensive, and the costs for applying for 501 (c)(3) status (tax-exemption for non-profits) can be considerably reduced by doing it yourself with the help of Legal Zoom. This ploy is not merely to pressure the priest and his episcopal handlers. When you take over the chapel, you will then be able to transfer all accounts to the new charitable corporation to make certain that the old corporation and its inherently evil structure are forever abolished.

The second task is to begin looking for a replacement priest. The bishop-commissars who control your current priest will never really suffer the laity to take complete control. (They despise laymen.) Therefore, even if your priest agrees to stay, unless you secure from him a written contract whereby he forswears any and all connections with these rogue bishops, you must plan for his eventual replacement.

Good and willing  priests are not as scarce as the cult masters would have you believe. Soon there'll be even more available if the SSPX reunites with the Vatican establishment. Don't worry: none of those newly available society priests will affiliate with "One-Hand Dan" or the rector. For one thing, even the youngest of them knows he possesses a superior spiritual and theological formation (and better general education, too). No, they'll cleave to the dissenting SSPX bishops who will abandon Fellay.

If you don't want an ex-society priest, there are many other traditional bishops around who can put you in contact with a priest who may be willing to serve your chapel, either as a resident or as a missionary. Don't worry about any distracting slanders that such priests are under- prepared. Nowadays, outside of the SSPX, no one is trained well (as the failed MHT completers have so ably proved).  Anyway, today we only need priests who can offer Mass correctly, hear confessions (without abusing the tribunal of penance in the interest of thought-control), and competently perform burial rites.


That's the bottom line: a basic Catholic life without all the noise introduced by control-freak wandering "prelates" who hope to fatten their retirement funds.

STEP X OF XII: REMOVE ALL RESOURCES

You might think your struggle against hypergreedy clergy in the cause of just governance is asymmetric. The priest, or at least his masters, may "own" the corporation. They may have rigged everything to their advantage. They may control the bank accounts. The building and its contents are probably in their name or in the name of one of the many corporations they control. It would seem, then, the laity are powerless.

Nothing could be more removed from the truth! The laity still have the power of the purse and their sweat equity. Buildings and institutions don't perpetuate themselves. They require money and material assistance to continue. The mortgage, insurance, and utilities must be paid, repairs made, the property cleaned and  maintained. The priest needs daily Mass stipends and his monthly salary to feed his shameless face. More importantly, "One-Hand" and the rector count on those regular "special" collections and management fees to see them through. Furthermore, the ill-trained and indolent clergy rely on the laity to perform any number of important duties, from taking the collection and managing records to cleaning the toilets and doing odd jobs.

The puppet masters no longer possess the cash safety-net they once enjoyed. Too many scandals have rumbled under the bridge. Most people with a conscience are sick of them. Therefore, when your chapel decides to withhold all support, the clergy won't be able to ride out the storm. With no money, the bills will go unpaid. With no helping hands, the property will deteriorate swiftly because most of the addled MHT completers are work-averse.

The cult masters may threaten to recall their knuckle-dragging clergy. If they do, then call their bluff. Tell them you are ready to establish a separate corporation and look elsewhere for a priest. They can't afford to take on extra mouths to feed -- and they probably don't want some of these grotesque characters hanging around anyway.

If a scintilla of reason prevails, they will break. If not, be assured that you have real alternatives.

STEP IX OF XII: ADOPT BYLAWS

The first task of the newly elected board and officers is to produce bylaws for the chapel (even though it has not yet converted to a membership corporation). The aim of the effort is (1) to show the faithful the promise of good governance and (2) to be prepared to file the bylaws with your state agency when you either modify your present corporation or establish a new chapel, if the priest irrationally and undemocratically resists the will of the people.

Except for the charter, the bylaws are the most important document an organization possesses, for they protect the corporation and its members. Not only do bylaws define the organization's structure and spell out the rights and obligations of its members, they are the permanent law of an organization. In other words, well-written bylaws guarantee there will be no lawless one-man rule as long as members vigilantly defend their right to majority rule and self-determination. With bylaws, the priest cannot behave as a law unto himself or wantonly spend your money. Bylaws ensure the rule of law will take the place of the fickle dictates of a priestly Politburo controlled by greedy--and dubious--Chairman-Prelates bent on feathering their own nests at the people's expense.

Writing bylaws from scratch is challenging and time consuming. Therefore, to assist you, Pistrina has searched the web for good examples and cobbled together model bylaws that you can use to get started. You'll note that not only are there protections for the members and officers but also for the priest. Lay governance never proposes to make the Traddie priest a slave; instead, under it, he becomes a partner with the laity for the sanctification of souls. In fact, the effect of lay governance is to free the priest from abject slavery to Mammon.  No longer need the priesthood be demeaned because the clergy feel obliged to substitute the petty chase after earthly goods for the pursuit of a heavenly crown. 

Under lay governance, there can be no opportunity to squander chapel assets on "pastoral" junkets to France and Mexico, or on"pilgrimages" to exclusive spa resorts in the tony, desert Southwest, or on "penitential" gourmet restaurant fare of escargots in garlic-butter sauce paired, no doubt, with an overpriced Petit Chablis.* The elected board will oversee all expenditures. No longer will the priest's unrestrained wants be passed off as the faithful's needs. Considered deliberation will replace the arbitrary whims of one ill-formed man (or his masters). Decent bylaws erect a Chinese wall of sorts between your money and the outsized avarice of the clergy. As an added bonus, the laity will be free from the malignant influence of the sacerdotal security state with its secret denunciations and surprise expulsions:

The day when a coven of ill-omened clergy feeding off the laity's generosity will be finished.

*This last expenditure is particularly wasteful considering the clerical gang we have in mind. They would really prefer to scarf up a steaming paper plate of deep-fried cubed Spam smothered in canned bean dip and washed down with noisy swigs of well-iced red pop (from a plastic bottle, to be sure: they love it when the polyethylene body collapses inwardly with a sharp crack as they greedily chug the contents). However, to keep their hold over their hollow-eyed cultists, they have to pretend to be men of wide culture,  exquisite taste, and rare connoisseurship. Too bad for your wallet. You have to pay for both repasts!

STEP VIII OF XII: HOLD A MASS MEETING

The feral clergy who prey upon the laity in "One-Hand" Dan's squalid little parcel of Traddielandia are small-souled, lupine self-servers. For that reason, you were probably served a no-trespass notice after you showed up at Mass. More than likely, the priest's base instincts overcame him, so he caused an unforgivable scandal by ordering the police to remove you from your own chapel.

Assuredly, it was an unedifying experience, especially for the children who witnessed the incident. Nonetheless, it's one the steering committee should have welcomed, as it set the stage for the mass meeting we had advised. The faithful will have seen with their own eyes the priest's intolerably boorish, irreligious behavior.  They will be ready to follow the committee's lead.

The agenda for the meeting should be short. The committee will first explain its two-fold goal of converting the chapel to a membership corporation and having the priest ordained conditionally (if he received holy orders from "One-Hand" Dan). Explain that the central objective is to allow the faithful to have a strong voice in running the chapel that they support with their hard-earned money. Given that the institutional Church is no longer in operation during the Sede Vacante, it isn't safe to put all the chapel's cash and goods into the hands of one improperly formed man, whose orders may be doubtful. Absent a divine institution into which people can safely put their trust, transparency and accountability are the only means to guarantee the good stewardship of your property.


Some of your fellow parishioners may question why the priest must be conditionally ordained. Some (who could not critically read Tony the Blunderer's monograph* on one-handed ordination) may comment, like a night-school lawyer who wrote us recently, that "the Holy Office during the 1950's repeatedly declared ordination with one hand valid for ALL grades of Holy Orders."


Well, the quoted account of the Holy Office's decisions is merely a hearsay anecdote from an unnamed bishop. Certainly we don't assert that the esteemed Fr. Regatillo, the author of the quote, made up the tale out of whole cloth. We merely insist that, without written documentation from the Holy Office, a speculative doubt about the validity of "One-Hand" Dan's orders remains in light of Pius XII 1947 Apostolic Constitution on orders. (As we have pointed out, the rector once shared this doubt, too.)


There's no record that the missing ceremony was later supplied to cure the defect or that "One-Hand" ever received conditional ordination before his consecration. Therefore, the only way to remove any doubt about the orders of a priest ordained by "One-Hand" is through conditional ordination by a bishop who had been properly ordained a priest.

After explaining the two objectives, the next item of business will be the election of a board of directors with a president, treasurer, and secretary. This elected body will replace the steering committee and will function as a shadow governing agent until the priest comes to his senses. After the election, inform the faithful that the next step will be the drafting of  bylaws for the reformed corporation so that there will be democratic rules to inform the chapel's leadership.   Next week, in Step IX, Pistrina will provide a model document.


* As we have explained before in several palces, the Blunderer's article, "The Validity of Ordination Conferred with One Hand," suffers from a fatal mistranslation of the most important point under dispute. For those with the patience to work through the technical details, here is an analysis of the error that renders the piece unusable in definitively deciding the question of "One-Hand's" orders. (A knowledge of Latin is not necessary to follow the argument.)

STEP VII OF XII: PUT YOUR MONEY WHERE YOUR MOUTH IS

Now, you can be sure that a pesthouse completer won't have sense enough to acquiesce immediately to your committee's reasonable and just demands. Although they don't have much education, these slow-witted clergy have well learned from their Svengalis one lesson: keep control of the people's money and property. Our bet, then, is that the priest won't even take a hour to make his decision. He'll tell you no right then and there. More than likely, he'll kick you out of the chapel, adding that if you return to demand the sacraments, as is your right as a Catholic, he'll call the police.


When that happens, mobilize. First, email everyone in the chapel to tell them what he has done and invite everyone to a public meeting to discuss the crisis and to organize. (More about that next week). Your community probably has many venues that can accommodate your chapel, e.g., libraries or recreation centers. Next, everyone on the committee must get on the phone to give others a first-hand account of the priest's un-Christian and undemocratic behavior. Encourage everyone to withhold all offerings and to stop their pledges until the priest sees reason.


On the ensuing Sunday, all members of the steering committee are to show up at the chapel and take their seats in the pews. If the priest demands that you leave, quietly stay put. Make him call the police and wait until they arrive to escort you out. Be sure that you have people who will video the whole event and others standing by to call local TV and radio stations as well as the newspaper.  Let the rattled pesthouse priest lose his temper, not you. 


If the priest doesn't have you removed, at collection time, observe who is giving, so that you can counsel them in Christian candor. Use the time after Mass to dispel any misgivings some people may have. Distribute copies of the act of perfect contrition to allay any fears the priest may have maliciously stirred up in an effort to win support through lies and intimidation. Encourage everyone to stand united so that the chapel can remain in their hands. Let them know that with time, even the densest of priests can be made to do the right thing and work for the parish and for not himself or his puppet masters.

STEP VI OF XII: MEET WITH THE PRIEST

This is the shortest step of our 12-Point Program. The steering committee simply sits down with the priest to tell him (1) that the chapel is to become a membership corporation run by an elected lay board, to which he will be subordinate, and (2) that he is to seek conditional ordination if he was ordained by "One-Hand Dan." Then let him know that, if he refuses to accede to this sensible petition, you will withhold financial support and cancel your pledges.

Make it clear that the steering committee will use all its influence and resources to mobilize the entire chapel in an effort to make the priest see reason or face insolvency. Be sure he understands that no threats, imprecations, or empty appeals to canon law will deter the committee from its just objective. Explain that everyone is prepared to live a Catholic life without a priest in the event of his refusal.

Then give him one hour to make his decision.