Much, Much More On OLA And The Archbishop's Appeal

I've had a series of remarkably informative e-mails from people familiar with how the Archbishop's Appeal was conducted at the Our Lady of the Atonement parish, as well as the archdiocese's policy in the appeal. The importance of the appeal to the archdiocese is reflected in the Parish Manual from the archdiocese, available online. From this, it's plain that pledges and payments are received and administered by the archdiocesan office, which as we'll see below has staff dedicated to this purpose. Instructions to parish pastors on how to represent the appeal on specified Sundays are outlined in detail.

From this, it's clear that deviation from the detailed policies and instructions from the archdiocese would normally be harmful to a pastor's career, and it's increasingly plain that Fr Phillips in fact deviated. Indeed, it's hard not to imagine that he was protected for much of his time at OLA from consequences that would have been grave for just about anyone else. Several visitors pointed out that what was printed in the parish bulletin wasn't necessarily what Fr Phillips actually said in announcements at mass, and the mild suggestion in the 2015 bulletin announcement, published here the other day, that parishioners make appeal checks payable to the parish, would probably have been represented more strongly by Fr Phillips in person.

A visitor said,

To your request for info, we were regularly instructed in the bulletin to write the check for the Archbishop's appeal directly to the parish, and they would send one check.

Another said,

I read with interest your posts of the last few days regarding OLA and money, since my husband and I always thought it odd that we would have to write the check to the parish and then they would send amount to whichever group, be it the archdiocese, lenten charities, etc. We did start giving directly to the SA archdiocese years back, which we mailed in a card with "OLA parish' directly marked on it. I did just make my first donation to the ordinariate, which was duly mailed directly to Houston.

A second collection as recently as July 16, after Fr Phillips's retirement but before Fr Lewis's arrival, was conducted as follows:

This Sunday there is an Ordinariate-wide Second Collection for the Church’s Missionary and Charitable Activities.

There is a bowl near the entrance where you may place your gifts. Make your checks payable to Our Lady of the Atonement Church, and mark it “Second Collection” or you may mail your check to the parish office this week. We will then send one check to the Ordinariate Chancery Office.

How this relates to OCSP policy is unknown, but if Fr Perkins is unaware of what's going on here, perhaps he should pay closer attention. UPDATE: I'm told that in this case, sending a single check is consistent with OCSP policy. However, I still question whether this misses a chance for Houston to identify potential donors -- it sounds to me as though the Archdiocese of San Antonio would be on the case more closely, as outlined in the e-mail below.

Another visitor sent a long and detailed e-mail that's worth publishing in it's entirety, but redacting any identifying incidentals. As far as I can see, the individual is very knowledgeable about the Archdiocese of San Antonio but has never been registered at the OLA parish and does not seem to be part of any pro- or anti-Phillips OLA faction:

I can’t speak for OLA but I will tell you that is an irregular practice in the Archdiocese of San Antonio. In all my experience with Archbishop’s Appeals in SA, my home parish has always instructed the faithful to MAKE the check out to the Archbishop’s Appeal (along with the accompanying paperwork/envelope) and put it in the collection plate to be forwarded to the Archdiocese by the parish staff or to mail/sign up for auto debits from accounts/credit cards or otherwise remit funds DIRECTLY to the Archdiocese.

Just to see what would happen with my money if I put it in the collection plate payable to my home parish with a note on the memo line, I called our parish bookkeeper and asked. She told me it would be put into the general parish account and would not be credited to the appeal. She very politely explained that the checks should be made payable to the Archbishop’s Appeal so that they could be forwarded on by the parish. I inquired as to who keeps track of what is given and she patiently explained that the Archdiocese tracks all that, the parish doesn’t. Got it, thanks! Next, I called the Office of the Archbishop of San Antonio and was transferred to someone who answered the phone “Archbishop’s Appeal” so I asked her the same questions. Of course, this lady was a little more interested in whether or not I had filled out a pledge card and what my name and address was so she could get my account number and see what my pledge balance was. After assuring her that I had already met my pledge amount for the year, she was more amenable to answering my questions. This lady, too, was adamant about making the checks payable to the Archbishop’s Appeal directly. I asked her who reports funds to the IRS for tax purposes and she said the Archdiocese does. ( I know this is true because each year I receive a separate “this is tax deductible” statement from my home parish for regular and special collections and the Archdiocese for the amount of our Appeal gift.) I pressed the kind lady a little further, asking about people who make their checks payable to their home parish. The lady explained that happens on occasion and that it is a little distressing because the parishioner DOES NOT get Appeal credit for the contribution. She told me that she has had people call her and ask if the Archdiocese received their funds, when the reply was negative this was determined to be the culprit, so again, she emphasized how important it was to send the money DIRECTLY to the Archbishop’s Appeal (and fill out a pledge card). I thanked her for her help and before I hung up, I gave her my address (because the kind lady was required to keep a record of the calls she received about the Appeal); I’m sure she immediately looked up my contribution history to see what kind of nincompoop was asking such silly questions…

As I was typing about this call to you, I was chuckling to myself about the nice lady’s obsession with a pledge card. Yes, yes, the pledge card was used by the Archdiocese to keep tabs on who was giving money and to which parish they belonged. The paperwork also serves as a way for the Archdiocese to set up individual accounts for each contributor so the Archdiocese can track who gives what each year, what parishes have contributors and then directly market to individuals in subsequent years, encouraging them to up their contribution ever so slightly each year (i.e. “thank you for your contribution last year of $xx, would you prayerfully consider increasing your contribution this year to $xx + $x? —very personal, very specific, very modest increase and a VERY effective marketing strategy). These letters are direct mailed to contributors each year in addition to the materials marketed through the parishes (hence the built-in costs of the Appeal campaign that is enumerated quite clearly in the Archbishop’s Appeal literature that specifies how funds raised are allocated- nice and transparent, see?).

Pledge cards, pledge cards, but then it occurred to me, pledge cards are ALSO used by parishes and the Archdiocese as part of the calculation used to determine if a parish has raised the requisite 50% of funds to begin building on a capital project. Pledges of funds are considered by the Archdiocese to be actual funds so if a parish needs to raise six million dollars to build a high school, the parish needs to show the Archdiocese that they have at least three million dollars in their bank accounts or money in their accounts and PLEDGES from parishioners to make up the difference to get to the 50% threshold for construction to begin. Hmmm.

(As a former banker, I worked for a series of Savings and Loan/Banks that merged and eventually ended up being part of [redacted], I would tell you to follow the money. If power derives from knowledge, imagine what power you as a pastor have if you know exactly WHO gave WHAT (or DIDN’T give for that matter) to the Archbishop’s Appeal ( remember other pastors have no idea who is contributing to the Archbishop’s Appeal until after the campaign is over and the Archdiocese tells them how much over or under the parish is total). If your parish is built on the premise that it is the sole outpost of reverent Catholicism and the Archbishop is verily only steps away from being the Antichrist (okay, maybe a little hyperbole), wouldn’t it be helpful to see who in your parish was being loyal to the pastor and who was loyal to the enemy (insert “Archbishop”).

So why would OLA ask parishioners to make the checks payable to OLA? Aside from the obvious advantage of an essentially interest-free loan of tens of thousands of dollars for the OLA parish/school’s operating budget for 9 months or so each year, and the ability of a pastor to see who is giving big bucks to the Archdiocese to determine if a well-heeled parishioner is holding out on a pledge card for your parish’s capital campaign projects why else would they do it? I can only imagine…

Again, I've got to think that any ordinary diocesan pastor who violated detailed and important policies so consistently would suffer grave consequences. My guess, which I've made here before, is that Fr Phillips had important protectors, including for at least a number of years Cardinal Law, and it was only as his protectors faded from the picture that Abp Garcia-Siller felt able to move.

Such a move appears to have been fully justified, and I can't attribute delays exclusively to Abp Garcia-Siller, or indeed his predecessors.