Synodality is a sham. The decision to close that diocese was made and while the powers that be may be content to delay implementing their decision for a bit to give lip service to “listening to the local community” the administrators removal just shows they will jettison anyone who objects too loudly or effectively.
This is very similar to how the government operates. It creates a plan and decides to fund it and go through with it, and only after this does it open up a period of time to the public for comments and concerns.
Wouldn’t it be ironic if - after the merger approval is rubber stamped by canon lawyers - Fernandes got his archbishop’s pallium from Pope Francis while in Rome posing for the October synodality meetings?
I ask this with no flippancy intended, but what does it matter if it's merged? As a lay person, if my diocese merged with another, I wouldn't really anticipate it impacting my spiritual life. Thinking of the clergy, they're going to be getting a new bishop regardless. Does it matter if it's +Fernandez or an unknown who's a wild card? It apparently does matter given the strength of the feelings involved, and I'm not intending to be callous, but I guess I'm failing to understand why as an outsider.
Think about the geography itself. +Fernandez would be stretched even further geographically; there's hardly any way he could give the whole merged diocese equal attention. Inevitably people on the "margins" would fall through the cracks. Moreover, the merging of a diocese allows for less freedom of choice for the people within the area as everyone in the Steubenville diocese would now have to follow rules they had no part in making and no connection to.
Our diocese already takes about 5 hours to go from north tip to south tip. Ironically, from what I have heard, the farther in the diocese you get away from Steubenville, the less objection there is to the merger. I think the people who live in Steubenville are less familiar with the feeling of being on the margins of much bigger things. (Remember, we are only about population 18,000, and less than 30% are Catholic.)
Pierre and Fernandes do not care about Steubenville. Plain and simple.
“the merging of a diocese allows for less freedom of choice for the people within the area as everyone in the Steubenville diocese would now have to follow rules they had no part in making and no connection to.”
Not the impression I got when I was there a decade ago. Poor, and despondent, all the social and economic problems… but not conservative in that sense or insular just forgotten and suspicious of having their collective heart broken. Everyone who could leave had left already and not many but a few foolhardy souls were coming to a poor old steel town.
Nope. You wrote authoritatively but omitted the usual clarification of credibility (e.g. "I've lived there all my life"; "I graduated from Franciscan eight years ago"), so I thought I'd ask.
Also, people sometimes don't want to change for very good reason, and change is often bad. Especially in a downtrodden area like that, I think people are understandably distrustful of anything that upsets the status quo without offering substantial improvement.
Actually I don't think either of you are accurate. In the last year or two there have been dozens and dozens -- maybe a hundred -- new families that have come here, because of the Catholic community, but also because the cost of living, especially housing, is cheaper than almost anywhere else. You will find a few curmudgeons anywhere who are totally closed, but generally we are a welcoming bunch. And half the Catholic talking heads of the world make their way through here at some point, so it's not like we don't mix with the outside world -- lol.
Recently Matt Fradd said something like (I don't remember precisely) 110 families had moved to Steubenville last year to be part of the Catholic subculture there.
To a priest, I think it could matter if he assumed he would serve the people in a particular area and found himself transferred to a parish far away. Similarly, as a layperson used to a higher number of priests “per capita” it could be hard if priests were transferred out of the area, leaving them with fewer priests and possibly fewer parishes. I’m not saying that this will happen, but it is a way that I could see the merger having an impact on a person’s life.
The movements probably would happen, to some extent.
Bishops move priests to the boonies when they do things the bishop doesn't like. The boonies get a lot further away when the diocese gets bigger.
If you have a small, fervent group producing a lot of priests, even if the bishop doesn't get annoyed with any of them, some of them are going to be transferred to areas further away that do not produce so many priests, because the bishop has a responsibility for the care of those souls. It tends to be harder on the priests, as they have more work and less support (and fewer nearby friends).
Sounds a lot like being Punished for Success, like what happens in a lot of toxic business environments.
Those who are the most productive in the work are given more work because they have a record of doing the job well and reliably. The least productive are given less work. So you end up with the best employees burning out and leaving, which leaves the company with the lower performers and new hires. The overall profit of the company nosedive.
I imagine this is what will happen in Steubenville. Priests are transferred to fill positions elsewhere and there are fewer role models and interactions in the areas producing more seminarians.
The number of seminarians plummets, moral decreases, and everything spirals down.
It *can* go that way. But I think you can give good performers more work than poor performers to some extent without burning them out, as long as you give them good support, and in justice give them the rewards of their superior labor.
There is a bit of a difference with priests, in that they work for God first, then the bishop, they gave Him a blank check (we hope), and the bishop a promise of obedience (which has some limits), rather than being able to walk out tomorrow with no breach of their obligations. The level of trust priests have in bishops says something about the support they are getting from them. Either the bishop isn't providing it, or the priests figure he won't, and don't ask.
Exactly what I think is happening. Columbus needs priests and rather than getting their parishioners to make holy hours for vocations they will simply merge the diocese and send the Steubenville priests to what is now the Columbus diocese. Dreadful, and a sure way to decrease the number of vocations and possibly even of current priests right now.
I live here, and frankly I have these same thoughts.
As a town, we have a culture of pessimism, glory days long gone, etc, so I think there is a strong feeling that once again we are going to be relegated to the trash heap . There is great fear of loss. But there is also a great deal of frustration with the mismanagement of our cathedral reconstruction, financial scandal, lack of transperancy, that we have been dealing with over the last several years. I feel like a lot of our clergy has been demoralized by past leadership decisions.
Not particularly. I can understand how it would look better on paper, though. There isn't a single major city, or even a large town, in the whole diocese.
Does the merger elevate Columbus to an archdiocese? If so Christophe Cardinal Pierre can put the archbishop’s pallium on “his guy” and former direct report in the Apostolic Nunciature in Washington, DC - none other than the fast-rising BISHOP Earl Fernandes.
Wreaks of nepotism but I’ll let The Pillar’s investigative journalists try to penetrate Pierre’s Iron Curtain.
• How does Columbus OH benefit (status obviously but financially) by absorbing The Catholic University of Steubenville and Scott Hahn’s St. Paul Institute?
• Does the merger elevate Columbus to an archdiocese and continue Bp. Fernandes’ meteoric rise with an archbishop’s pallium (with a little help from his old boss at the apostolic nunciature in DC, Christophe Cardinal Pierre?
Something tells me Pierre wouldn’t go to Steubenville even with a free private jet ride…
Thank you THE PILLAR. Many more questions than answers here.
Franciscan University of Steubenville and the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology are separate entities not at all tied in any official capacity to the diocese.
They needed a canon lawyer to justify the pre-ordained answer that obviously was not shared with Bradley. Cardinal Pierre’s people skills are so bad that he now places the Bishop (Lohse) and the Bishop Emeritus (Bradley) of the same diocese at odds over the likely pre-ordained merger. Fortunately both Bishops Bradley and Lohse are consummate professionals and will not lower themselves to the nepotism and pettiness that the Papal Nuncio is fostering here.
It seems there could be other dioceses in the country that could be in a situation to merge. Not one that seems to be stable with priestly vocations and Mass attendance.
My spiritual hero and hometown friend. Another sign that mission does not matter in today’s US church. Juridical structures and clerical power returning us to the Middle of not Dark Ages.
I very much question the theory that small dioceses are less sustainable than middle size or larger ones. Last November, The Pillar published an article that described a survey of the sizes of dioceses in the United States and the number of seminarians per capita. It indicated that there is a substantial inverse relationship between the size of a diocese and the number of seminarians per capita. That result is not surprising. For in smaller diocese the bishop can, if he chooses, more easily be a father figure. By contrast, in larger dioceses the bishop is more remote, and the chancery tends to be seen as the central administration of a nonprofit organization, rather than an inspiring example. As a result, I think that the solution to whatever issues there are in the Stubenbville Diocese should be solved more by a dynamic, personable and trusted bishop than by merging it into another diocese, especially given the fact that most of the clergy and laity seem to oppose such a merger.
A canon lawyer will now create a case for the pre-ordained (Cardinal Pierre and Bishop Fernandes, others need not assess or provide facts) merger solution. Clericalism again triumphs over synodality. Thank you dear Bishop Bradley for pushing a rope for your first nine months of retirement.
I remember when DiNardo wanted to consolidate or close some churches after one of the hurricanes destroyed the cathedral and some churches in Galveston area . I think he ended up rebuilding the cathedral and some of the other churches.
Bishop Bradley and Cardinal DiNardo were co-pastors of Madonna Del Castello Parish in Swissvale (Pittsburgh) PA. Maybe the Cardinal will stand up to the autocratic Pierre….
// “His candor really helped a lot of us have trust in the Church again,” one Steubenville priest told The Pillar. “Of course, all of this isn’t going to help with that.”
Another Steubenville priest described Bradley as the “most authentically Christian man I’ve ever met.”
Bradley also received praise from prominent local Catholics in the Steubenville diocese.
“He’s the kind of spiritual father that, I admit, I strive to be. His leadership is so gentle and strong — not anxious,” local professor Scott Hahn, an internationally known speaker and author, told The Pillar earlier this year. //
But evidently the sort of human being of which the Church bureaucracy disapprove. Today's Church is monumentally flawed. Especially in these extraordinarily troubled times, we desperately need many more Bradleys.
Hearing the news of Bishop Bradley‘s replacement makes me very sad. After years of turmoil we finally received a spiritual father to lead our diocese, who was able to look at our difficult situation without prejudice. Where is the so called “synodality” in all this? Why was no one consulted? The laity?
Absolutely. I have never in thirty+ years of priesthood experienced a bishop of his caliber. He's the kind of Christian the devil hates. And it seems the hierarchy does as well.
One of many questions I have for the Nuncio (and his handlers in Rome) is: How does this pre-ordained merger exemplify the principle of subsidiarity? God loves small things, just sayin".
Indeed. Technically true...and yet we're all aware that the Vatican is filled with alliances, espionage, subterfuge, cliques, shadow groups, and layers of power which don't precisely adhere to the canonical hierarchical structures.
“The change in diocesan administrator was made while the bishops were meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, for the June 12-14 spring plenary assembly of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Bradley and Fernandes told OSV News that the merger was expected to be assessed by U.S. bishops at this meeting prior to examination by the Vatican's Dicastery for Bishops and then Francis. The matter did not, however, appear on the assembly's public schedule. The bishops met privately June 12 and the morning of June 13.”
Synodality is a sham. The decision to close that diocese was made and while the powers that be may be content to delay implementing their decision for a bit to give lip service to “listening to the local community” the administrators removal just shows they will jettison anyone who objects too loudly or effectively.
That's certainly how this move makes it appear.
This is very similar to how the government operates. It creates a plan and decides to fund it and go through with it, and only after this does it open up a period of time to the public for comments and concerns.
Wouldn’t it be ironic if - after the merger approval is rubber stamped by canon lawyers - Fernandes got his archbishop’s pallium from Pope Francis while in Rome posing for the October synodality meetings?
I ask this with no flippancy intended, but what does it matter if it's merged? As a lay person, if my diocese merged with another, I wouldn't really anticipate it impacting my spiritual life. Thinking of the clergy, they're going to be getting a new bishop regardless. Does it matter if it's +Fernandez or an unknown who's a wild card? It apparently does matter given the strength of the feelings involved, and I'm not intending to be callous, but I guess I'm failing to understand why as an outsider.
I had a similar question. Maybe there is a worry that their resources will be directed elsewhere?
Think about the geography itself. +Fernandez would be stretched even further geographically; there's hardly any way he could give the whole merged diocese equal attention. Inevitably people on the "margins" would fall through the cracks. Moreover, the merging of a diocese allows for less freedom of choice for the people within the area as everyone in the Steubenville diocese would now have to follow rules they had no part in making and no connection to.
Our diocese already takes about 5 hours to go from north tip to south tip. Ironically, from what I have heard, the farther in the diocese you get away from Steubenville, the less objection there is to the merger. I think the people who live in Steubenville are less familiar with the feeling of being on the margins of much bigger things. (Remember, we are only about population 18,000, and less than 30% are Catholic.)
Pierre and Fernandes do not care about Steubenville. Plain and simple.
“the merging of a diocese allows for less freedom of choice for the people within the area as everyone in the Steubenville diocese would now have to follow rules they had no part in making and no connection to.”
Steubenville is very conservative and insular. I suspect they don't want outsiders.
Not the impression I got when I was there a decade ago. Poor, and despondent, all the social and economic problems… but not conservative in that sense or insular just forgotten and suspicious of having their collective heart broken. Everyone who could leave had left already and not many but a few foolhardy souls were coming to a poor old steel town.
A decade ago. Things change. They don't want change.
Do you live there?
I have friends who currently live there. Do you live there?
Nope. You wrote authoritatively but omitted the usual clarification of credibility (e.g. "I've lived there all my life"; "I graduated from Franciscan eight years ago"), so I thought I'd ask.
Also, people sometimes don't want to change for very good reason, and change is often bad. Especially in a downtrodden area like that, I think people are understandably distrustful of anything that upsets the status quo without offering substantial improvement.
Actually I don't think either of you are accurate. In the last year or two there have been dozens and dozens -- maybe a hundred -- new families that have come here, because of the Catholic community, but also because the cost of living, especially housing, is cheaper than almost anywhere else. You will find a few curmudgeons anywhere who are totally closed, but generally we are a welcoming bunch. And half the Catholic talking heads of the world make their way through here at some point, so it's not like we don't mix with the outside world -- lol.
Recently Matt Fradd said something like (I don't remember precisely) 110 families had moved to Steubenville last year to be part of the Catholic subculture there.
It's significant. Definitely not every new family is Catholic. But I'd venture to say probably most are.
To a priest, I think it could matter if he assumed he would serve the people in a particular area and found himself transferred to a parish far away. Similarly, as a layperson used to a higher number of priests “per capita” it could be hard if priests were transferred out of the area, leaving them with fewer priests and possibly fewer parishes. I’m not saying that this will happen, but it is a way that I could see the merger having an impact on a person’s life.
The movements probably would happen, to some extent.
Bishops move priests to the boonies when they do things the bishop doesn't like. The boonies get a lot further away when the diocese gets bigger.
If you have a small, fervent group producing a lot of priests, even if the bishop doesn't get annoyed with any of them, some of them are going to be transferred to areas further away that do not produce so many priests, because the bishop has a responsibility for the care of those souls. It tends to be harder on the priests, as they have more work and less support (and fewer nearby friends).
Sounds a lot like being Punished for Success, like what happens in a lot of toxic business environments.
Those who are the most productive in the work are given more work because they have a record of doing the job well and reliably. The least productive are given less work. So you end up with the best employees burning out and leaving, which leaves the company with the lower performers and new hires. The overall profit of the company nosedive.
I imagine this is what will happen in Steubenville. Priests are transferred to fill positions elsewhere and there are fewer role models and interactions in the areas producing more seminarians.
The number of seminarians plummets, moral decreases, and everything spirals down.
It *can* go that way. But I think you can give good performers more work than poor performers to some extent without burning them out, as long as you give them good support, and in justice give them the rewards of their superior labor.
There is a bit of a difference with priests, in that they work for God first, then the bishop, they gave Him a blank check (we hope), and the bishop a promise of obedience (which has some limits), rather than being able to walk out tomorrow with no breach of their obligations. The level of trust priests have in bishops says something about the support they are getting from them. Either the bishop isn't providing it, or the priests figure he won't, and don't ask.
Exactly what I think is happening. Columbus needs priests and rather than getting their parishioners to make holy hours for vocations they will simply merge the diocese and send the Steubenville priests to what is now the Columbus diocese. Dreadful, and a sure way to decrease the number of vocations and possibly even of current priests right now.
I live here, and frankly I have these same thoughts.
As a town, we have a culture of pessimism, glory days long gone, etc, so I think there is a strong feeling that once again we are going to be relegated to the trash heap . There is great fear of loss. But there is also a great deal of frustration with the mismanagement of our cathedral reconstruction, financial scandal, lack of transperancy, that we have been dealing with over the last several years. I feel like a lot of our clergy has been demoralized by past leadership decisions.
Do you see any pluses for a merger with Columbus?
Not particularly. I can understand how it would look better on paper, though. There isn't a single major city, or even a large town, in the whole diocese.
Does the merger elevate Columbus to an archdiocese? If so Christophe Cardinal Pierre can put the archbishop’s pallium on “his guy” and former direct report in the Apostolic Nunciature in Washington, DC - none other than the fast-rising BISHOP Earl Fernandes.
Wreaks of nepotism but I’ll let The Pillar’s investigative journalists try to penetrate Pierre’s Iron Curtain.
Columbus gets hidden treasure in Marietta OH
https://stmarysmarietta.org/
Asking a few pertinent questions:
• How does Columbus OH benefit (status obviously but financially) by absorbing The Catholic University of Steubenville and Scott Hahn’s St. Paul Institute?
• Does the merger elevate Columbus to an archdiocese and continue Bp. Fernandes’ meteoric rise with an archbishop’s pallium (with a little help from his old boss at the apostolic nunciature in DC, Christophe Cardinal Pierre?
Something tells me Pierre wouldn’t go to Steubenville even with a free private jet ride…
Thank you THE PILLAR. Many more questions than answers here.
Franciscan University of Steubenville and the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology are separate entities not at all tied in any official capacity to the diocese.
Columbus will not become an archdiocese.
Thanks for the reporting!
As a Kalamazoo resident, it's interesting our former Bishop Bradley held this post and current bishop Lohse hold this post
The merger no one saw coming. Kalamazoobenville.
They needed a canon lawyer to justify the pre-ordained answer that obviously was not shared with Bradley. Cardinal Pierre’s people skills are so bad that he now places the Bishop (Lohse) and the Bishop Emeritus (Bradley) of the same diocese at odds over the likely pre-ordained merger. Fortunately both Bishops Bradley and Lohse are consummate professionals and will not lower themselves to the nepotism and pettiness that the Papal Nuncio is fostering here.
It seems there could be other dioceses in the country that could be in a situation to merge. Not one that seems to be stable with priestly vocations and Mass attendance.
FYI.
Dad
This is a great loss. Bishop Bradley is a good man.
My spiritual hero and hometown friend. Another sign that mission does not matter in today’s US church. Juridical structures and clerical power returning us to the Middle of not Dark Ages.
+FernandeS
I very much question the theory that small dioceses are less sustainable than middle size or larger ones. Last November, The Pillar published an article that described a survey of the sizes of dioceses in the United States and the number of seminarians per capita. It indicated that there is a substantial inverse relationship between the size of a diocese and the number of seminarians per capita. That result is not surprising. For in smaller diocese the bishop can, if he chooses, more easily be a father figure. By contrast, in larger dioceses the bishop is more remote, and the chancery tends to be seen as the central administration of a nonprofit organization, rather than an inspiring example. As a result, I think that the solution to whatever issues there are in the Stubenbville Diocese should be solved more by a dynamic, personable and trusted bishop than by merging it into another diocese, especially given the fact that most of the clergy and laity seem to oppose such a merger.
A canon lawyer will now create a case for the pre-ordained (Cardinal Pierre and Bishop Fernandes, others need not assess or provide facts) merger solution. Clericalism again triumphs over synodality. Thank you dear Bishop Bradley for pushing a rope for your first nine months of retirement.
Well, wonderful. The Vatican strikes again.
I remember when DiNardo wanted to consolidate or close some churches after one of the hurricanes destroyed the cathedral and some churches in Galveston area . I think he ended up rebuilding the cathedral and some of the other churches.
Bishop Bradley and Cardinal DiNardo were co-pastors of Madonna Del Castello Parish in Swissvale (Pittsburgh) PA. Maybe the Cardinal will stand up to the autocratic Pierre….
// “His candor really helped a lot of us have trust in the Church again,” one Steubenville priest told The Pillar. “Of course, all of this isn’t going to help with that.”
Another Steubenville priest described Bradley as the “most authentically Christian man I’ve ever met.”
Bradley also received praise from prominent local Catholics in the Steubenville diocese.
“He’s the kind of spiritual father that, I admit, I strive to be. His leadership is so gentle and strong — not anxious,” local professor Scott Hahn, an internationally known speaker and author, told The Pillar earlier this year. //
But evidently the sort of human being of which the Church bureaucracy disapprove. Today's Church is monumentally flawed. Especially in these extraordinarily troubled times, we desperately need many more Bradleys.
Amen
Hearing the news of Bishop Bradley‘s replacement makes me very sad. After years of turmoil we finally received a spiritual father to lead our diocese, who was able to look at our difficult situation without prejudice. Where is the so called “synodality” in all this? Why was no one consulted? The laity?
Absolutely. I have never in thirty+ years of priesthood experienced a bishop of his caliber. He's the kind of Christian the devil hates. And it seems the hierarchy does as well.
One of many questions I have for the Nuncio (and his handlers in Rome) is: How does this pre-ordained merger exemplify the principle of subsidiarity? God loves small things, just sayin".
He’s now a Cardinal, his only “handler” is the Holy Father
Indeed. Technically true...and yet we're all aware that the Vatican is filled with alliances, espionage, subterfuge, cliques, shadow groups, and layers of power which don't precisely adhere to the canonical hierarchical structures.
Our harmonious and synodal Curial Diplomatic corps… is Pierre an upgrade over Vigano?
https://open.substack.com/pub/thepillar/p/vigano-charged-with-schism-calls?r=wflz8&utm_medium=ios
Another mark of transparency and synodality:
“The change in diocesan administrator was made while the bishops were meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, for the June 12-14 spring plenary assembly of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Bradley and Fernandes told OSV News that the merger was expected to be assessed by U.S. bishops at this meeting prior to examination by the Vatican's Dicastery for Bishops and then Francis. The matter did not, however, appear on the assembly's public schedule. The bishops met privately June 12 and the morning of June 13.”
https://www.ncronline.org/news/steubenville-dioceses-leader-changes-amid-consideration-merger-columbus-diocese