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Orthodox Christian Laity - August 3, 2004
Observations On The Clergy-Laity Congress 2004
Commentary by Andrew Kartalis
Prior to the convening of the Clergy-Laity Congress there was
intimidation against individuals. Two parishioners (one the
President of a Parish Council) were denied to be delegates by a
Metropolitan, and two others, including this writer, had their delegate
status taken away by their Metropolitans after they had been elected by
their parish assemblies. These denials were done on an arbitrary
basis. While three of these denials were due to the individuals
being plaintiffs on the legal action regarding the charter, other
plaintiffs in four other Metropolises were allowed to serve as
delegates. Is this an indication of the fragmentation of the
Archdiocese into nine separate fiefdoms with nine different sets of rules
as has been feared with the elevation of our bishops to the rank of
metropolitans?
Why New York? Two years ago in Los Angeles there were lamentations about the
high cost of attending a Congress and that something needed to be done
about this. Holding it in Times Square certainly did not serve to
increase attendance. Of a possible 2280 here were only 805 delegates
registered, down from the number in LA.
In LA in 2002 there were more delegates questioning the Proposed Charter than the
number in New York questioning the Proposed Regulations. I submit
that this is because there is disillusionment and apathy caused by the
heavy-handed tactics used to impose the charter and the regulations.
By the time the Plenary Session rolled around at the end of the Congress,
there were only 439 voting delegates in attendance. The others had
left.
The charter was not allowed to be discussed in any manner. Any mention
of it by a delegate, and he was ruled out of order. Many delegations
had been directed by their parish assemblies to demand that the charter
issue be discussed on the floor of the Congress, so they were not able to
carry out their charge. They were emphatically told that the charter
was a closed issue.
The Proposed Regulations clearly stated that Congresses will abide by Robert's
Rules of Order. When delegates questioned or objected to the
heavy-handed procedures of the chairman of the Administration Committee by
referring to Robert's Rules, a motion was made and passed to add the
phrase "and custom and practice of prior Congresses", thus nullifying
Robert's Rules and affirming the past tradition of arbitrary rulings and
procedures of the chairs of the committees and the Plenary Sessions.
It was obvious from the beginning that there was never any intention to allow
parishes to review and act on the Proposed Regulations. While they
were submitted to other bodies of the Archdiocese in plenty of time to
review prior to the Congress, they were only received by the parishes
about two weeks prior to the Congress. When delegates objected that
the Proposed Regulations were not received 60 days in advance of the
Congress as called for in the Special Regulations, they were told that
the Regulations only states that the agenda need be sent out 60
days ahead, and that this was merely "a report" that was to be reviewed by
the Administration Committee and acted on at the Plenary Sessions.
Further, it was obvious that extraordinary efforts were made at the
Congress to pass the Regulations in a manner that would not allow them to
go to the parishes for any further review after the Congress prior to
final adoption. The two days allocated for their review obviously
did not suffice because of the volume of the work, so sessions were added
a third day and it was finally finished on the floor of the Plenary.
Requests that the vote at the Congress be considered a "First Reading",
thus allowing the Proposed Regulations to be sent to the parishes for
further review, were not allowed. The "ramming through" process of
the Proposed Regulations became further obvious at the Plenary that was
chaired by Demitri Moschos, who was on a mission to achieve passage of
them by utilizing a "take no prisoners" attitude. Speakers were
quickly ruled out of order, voting was by voice vote that was liberally
interpreted by the chair, and a "rush, rush" attitude was utilized which
cut off full debate of individual sections of the Proposed Regulations.
The section in the Proposed Regulations that states that the Archdiocese has
no members was allowed to stand. Surely this will have an impact on
the how the clergy and laity will view their status in the future in the
Church relative to the Archdiocese.
Apparently meaningless statistics:
• The Archbishop and the Archdiocese continue to misrepresent
the number of members in the Church as being 1,500,000, when in truth the
number by all calculations is closer to 400,000. (1,500,000 divided
by 540 parishes equals an average of 2800 parishioners for each parish in
America, an obvious impossibility!) Is this done in order to keep
the Church in the major religion category and not relegate it to minor
status?
• As in previous Congresses, the percentage of 'mixed
marriages' is announced as 80% of all marriages taking place in our
Church. A few comments about the problems this raises are made and
then the Congress goes on to discuss measures as how to further Hellenize
the Church.
The Budget presentation for 2004 and 2005 was not reassuring. Two years ago in
LA the Archdiocese had a debt of over $5 million, and the Archbishop
thankfully announced that monies had been donated by generous individuals
to erase the debt. But here, this year, we are back in debt to the
tune of $6.5 million with very little explanation of why. It was
pointed out that every department of the Archdiocese had exceeded its
budget and that fiscal integrity was needed there. This year's
budget showed a pay down of the debt by only $500,000. Will the
departments of the Archdiocese live within their budgets? Are there
any unknown extraordinary expenses out there?
Part of the over expenditures in 2003 were explained in that $1.5 million was paid
out to settle sexual harassment cases. The Archdiocese does not have
insurance to cover claims for damages from sexual abuse. Any
payments must be paid out of the operations budget. What was not
made known is how many cases did these payments involve, are there other
cases still pending, who the priests were, and are these priests still in
service? The secrecy of the Archdiocese in this area is reminiscent
of the methodology of the Catholic church, that has created the crisis in
that church. {
Most disturbing were the statements by George Behrakis,
a member of the Executive Committee of the Archdiocese published in the
July 24-25 issue of the National Herald. When asked to comment on
the $1.5 million dollar loan, Mr. Behrakis referred the interviewer to
Jerry Dimitriou and Manny Demos, "because I am not really knowledgeable in
that area", and further responded in response to the question, "You mean
you did not know about it?", he responded, "No, I was a little surprised
that $1.5 million was borrowed". This is an indication that even the
Executive Committee of the Archdiocesan Council, the highest level of
laity involvement in the Church, was left in the dark on such an important
matter.
There was a great deal of discussion about the Archdiocesan Total Commitment of
parishes. It is evident that stronger efforts will be made to
require each parish pay their 15% share of the Total Commitment on a
mandatory basis rather than the haphazard method prevalent today.
Statements were made that the parishes are 'hiding' money and measures to
force compliance needed to be included in the UPR. Delegates
responded that if the 'books' of the Archdiocese were more open, and if
the parishes could be assured that the funds of the Archdiocese were spent
prudently, more funds would be forthcoming. The punitive measures
that are included in the Proposed Regulations are severe if the monies are
not paid. Second, the issue of also including the income to Building
and Endowment funds of a parish in the Total Commitment calculations was
strongly pressed by the Archdiocese representatives, but just as strongly
opposed by many delegates. Fortunately, more reasonable views
prevailed and the proposal to include Building Funds and Endowments
was REMOVED by amendments made by the delegates.
The rules on property acquisition were tightened in the approvals that are
needed. However, the new requirement to require approvals for all
personal property (includes everything from pencils and paper to organs
and draperies and pews) were confusing. The Archdiocese agreed to
clarify this to mean only actions which have the effect of converting real
property into personal property. The most disturbing aspect is the
number of ways in the Proposed Regulations that a parish can be declared
to be in 'canonical disorder' by the Archbishop and Metropolitan, which
immediately triggers a takeover of parish property and the authority to
sign any deeds, etc. A parish can be in canonical disorder if its
Archdiocesan commitment is not completely paid, or if it fails to turn in
its annual financial records on time, for example.
With the tightened controls over a parish and its properties, should there be a
concern that a parish's assets are in any danger of loss in the event of a
sexual misconduct lawsuit and settlement? This happened to the
Catholic church which directly owned the parish properties, and it needs
to be considered carefully in our Church.
What will be the role of future Clergy-Laity Congresses? Since, according to
the Proposed Regulations they cannot initiate any legislation, that now
being the province of the Synod of Bishops, it can only serve to act as a
rubber stamp. So why meet for other than just social reasons?
Also, the membership of the Archdiocesan Council which is handpicked by
the hierarchs, is being increased by 50%, from 87 to 127. This is a
powerful voting block loyal to the wants of the hierarchs.
In summary, this Congress was more mean spirited than not, lacking in love
and fellowship. Certainly obvious is that the way they ran this
Congress meeting is one reason they have lawsuits. More important,
however, is the question of what do all the foregoing charters,
regulations and actions portend for the future of our Church? Are
they positive or negative? Will they help meet our spiritual
needs? Will they reverse the downward spiral of membership and allow
our Church to grow? Will it become the Church that will attract our
progeny and their spouses after we are gone? I think not, and I fear
that others are coming to the same conclusion.
[ Orthodox Truth - www.orthodox-truth.bugs3.com/art_56.html - August 3, 2004 ]
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