However, Morello’s record as a priest in The Episcopal Church raises questions about the ACA's judgment. An article in the Modesto, California Bee for June 18, 2005, covers the closing of the Episcopal mission parish St Dunstan’s Modesto, whose final priest was the same Anthony Morello. "The closure is based on dwindling attendance - and giving - at the Carver Road church, which draws about 50 Sunday worshipers,” says the article.
The article goes on to interview Morello on the cause of the dwindling attendance. Although the 2003 election of openly gay Bishop of New Hampshire Eugene Robinson had led to disaffection among many Episcopalians nationwide, this apparently wasn’t the issue in that case.
“[Diocesan CFO Duke] Golden and Morello said they don't think Robinson's ordination is why St. Dunstan's lost membership. Morello said people began leaving in 2003 when he became engaged to a woman from another parish whose children he previously counseled, and to whom he'd provided mediation services before her divorce.
“Attendance went from as many as 250 to about 50 people," Morello said.
“'I think the decline in membership has a direct bearing on that,' Morello said. 'When you have rumors and controversy in church, people leave.'”
In other words, the Episcopalians in Modesto had no need to find a scandal 3000 miles away to drive them out of the church, they had one right in town, courtesy of their own rector! By his own account, the rumors and controversy surrounding his own conduct were responsible for a decrease in attendance as high as 80%. The article goes on, “Current members did not wish to comment on what they saw as rumors. The Rev. Michael McClenaghan, rector of St. Paul's Episcopal Church referred questions to the bishop. 'He is ... much more intimately aware of the reasons that the people of St. Dunstan's are ending their ministry in Modesto,' he said.”
Following the closure of St Dunstan’s in 2005, I find Morello listed on some parish bulletins in a position called "Associate Assisting Interim Priest” during autumn 2007 and winter 2008 at St John the Baptist Episcopal Church, Lodi, CA. This is a highly unusual title -- a google search brings up nothing else like it anywhere! "Assisting" and "associate" are often used separately to describe priests who are low on the totem pole; seeing them combined in this way is unique -- and adding "interim" just rubs it in a little more! It's almost as though the parish was trying to keep him at arm's length. He simply pops up there, and then several months later he simply disappears again. As of 2012, he is not listed as an Episcopal priest on the web site of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles.
He moved back to southern California. (He had been Vicar of St Luke's Episcopal Mission in Fontana from 1995 to 1999, but left that post under uncertain circumstances.) By 2010 he had become a priest in the breakaway Anglican Church in America and had become an assistant priest at its tiny parish All Saints Fountain Valley, which currently styles itself a "cathedral" (the rectory is a mobile home in back); he became the parish’s rector in 2012. To add to his comic-opera titles, he is currently also Canon to the Ordinary for the ACA Diocesan Visitor, the Rt Rev Stephen D Strawn, Bishop of the Missouri Valley and, of course, he is now also Priest in Charge at St Mary’s Hollywood.
A profile appearing for Anthony Morello, a member of the Class of 1965 at St Frances De Chantal School, Brooklyn NY, on the Memory Lane website gives further information on what appears to be the same man's background:
In 1979 I relocated to California, and found a new life. I returned to school to complete my education, and married. Openined [sic] my own business (Travel and Charter Bus Company.) After awhile [sic] I decided to explore entering the Priesthood in the Episcopal Church, I was accepted and Ordained a Priest on August 14, 1993. I also earned a Ph D in Counseling Psychology in 1998, and have a practice working mostly with children. I also have a radio talk show called “This Week” on KVIN 920 AM in Modesto, Ca. We deal with Children and Family Issues. I have never lost the desire to laugh, and to treat life as if it is a Carnival. Over the years my Ministry has brought me to the Philippines, and most recently to Taganrog Russia. In both places I have started to build or rebuild Childrens Hospitals. Life has been good to me. The one thing I always attribute my success to in life is the training I received at St. Francis [sic], and those wonderful, wonderful Sisters that taught us. May God always Bless them and keep them.”
Since he referred to a radio show in Modesto, I contacted KVIN there and asked if an Anthony Morello had ever hosted such a show. The reply:
Sorry, no such show on KVIN since we've owned it [1997]. Don't know anything about it.The sketch on Memory Lane refers in the present tense to a period after his PhD in 1998, so this isn't helpful to Morello's overall credibility. There are other puzzling gaps in his background. Since his time in Modesto, he has represented himself as a mediator and Christian counselor as well as a priest, and in the sketch above, he refers to the PhD in Counseling Psychology he received in 1998.
Doug Wulff,
Co-owner, KVIN
In addition to his position as Rector of All Saints Fountain Valley, he currently operates a mediation business called Mediate Always. Its street address and phone number are the same as the church. He and a partner or associate appear on the Who We Are Page. Although he's representing himself as a mediation professional, his biography is completely blank, as is his biography on the All Saints Fountain Valley site, but there's a bio for his partner or associate, Mike Creek. Although Morello calls himself Dr and uses the degree after his name, no one I've talked to has been able to identify which institution issued his PhD (in fact, one person said this was in spite of repeated attempts). A potential client wishing to engage Morello's counseling and mediation services should be entitled to know where his PhD came from and what other professional certifications and memberships he has. These are typically listed in reputable professional bios, and their absence here should be cause for concern.
And while Morello has (according to the Modesto Bee story and by his own account on the Memory Lane site) practiced as a counselor, since he's an ordained clergyman, he is not required to be licensed by the State of California, and in fact no license record appears for either him or Mike Creek. There is also no state licensure requirement for anyone identifying himself as a mediator, and as this document points out,
Mediation is in its early stages of development as an area of study and professional practice. Consistent with the evolution of other fields, such as Psychology, the early stages of development of a field can seem chaotic as people from various disciplines and backgrounds jump into the new opportunity. Generally at this early stage there are little or no regulations of the field, many disparate professional groups and associations, no articulated standards or code of ethics, and no standardized training or curriculum requirements.
This description of an early stage of development in a field accurately describes the current state of affairs for mediation as a professional method of conflict resolution.
