Yet More On Stockport

The first visitor who provided an update here on Fr Kenyon's situation has elaborated further:

Fr Kenyon knew months in advance that he had been appointed to Our Lady's parish. Unknown to the parishioners, his parents had been coming to the weekend masses observing and no doubt reporting back to him what Our Lady's was like. Even from the outside it must have been obvious to his parents what the presbytery was like. The comment “a precipitous drop overlooking a railway marshaling yard" is incorrect. The busy railway sits across a busy road and is protected by a high wall. There is no realistic danger of falling onto the tracks.

When it was announced that our parish priest was leaving Our Lady's to make way for Fr Kenyon and his family, there was considerable anger by many parishioners. A lot of people wrote to the Bishop protesting at the appointment of Fr Kenyon before he had even arrived at Our Lady's. Of course, this was wrong and did nothing to make him feel welcome. Fr Kenyon knew that the Bishop had received unwelcoming correspondence about him and that a volatile situation existed before he even arrived in Stockport, yet almost immediately, he started making changes in Our Lady's much to the annoyance of many. Instead of attempting to calm things, he did the exact opposite. Could it be that Fr Kenyon failed to 'read' the situation correctly? An experienced priest would not have allowed the situation to deteriorate in the way it did. Things then escalated rapidly out of control. This could be attributable to a lack of experience.

It was suggested that the parishioners were cruel and unfriendly to him. Whilst some did indeed treat him unfairly, it must be said that the situation was not helped by rumors circulated that all the parishioners were hostile to him. From certain perspectives, it appeared that he was attempting to shift the blame for his problems onto the parishioners. That certainly did not help matters at all.

This unfortunate matter has done considerable damage to the reputation of Our Lady's Church. Whilst Fr Kenyon cannot be entirely to blame, he must shoulder the majority of the responsibility for whats happened. He has put his family through a traumatic experience, and he has left our parish community seriously damaged and hurt.

A common list of pastoral qualities that I see on Catholic sites includes these, among others:

• Ability to work with others
• Respect for other people
• Good social skills
• Capacity and desire to learn
• Capacity for friendship

Fr Kenyon was among the most senior priests in the OCSP, leading a full parish and the vicar forane for a deanery, yet it appears that he was lacking in many of these qualities. The visitor suggests, quite reasonablhy, that Fr Kenyon had a "lack of experience". This raises once more the question of why he left Calgary, what Bp Lopes knew, and why he thought moving Fr Kenyon was a good idea. I find it very hard to imagine that, given the reputation he's so quickly established, Fr Kenyon can find another appointment in the Diocese of Shrewsbury, or perhaps anywhere in the UK.

Another visitor noted,

RE: Fr. Kenyon, it’s very common that a new job proves to be utterly wrong almost from Day 1. Infant mortality in such positions happens all the time. It’s a shame that this case with Fr. Kenyon happened, given what apparently should have been careful pastoral oversight in his making the move. Yet I know you know such things happen in the real world, just as they do in marriages, sports coaching, etc.

I agree that I have unhappy personal experience of jobs being wrong from day one! On the other hand, looking back on those experiences, they arose pretty consistently because I was working in a new field, and in one particular case, it was a highly secure environment where I couldn't have known much about it beforehand anyhow. In those cases, expectations were unknowable or unreasonable-but-concealed. In Fr Kenyon's case, it seems as though the qualities that would be required of him were very clear, expectations were consistent throughout the Church, and in fact, given the account above, his parents had been scouting out the parish for months.

It's entirely possible, though, that Bp Lopes had no real understanding of the problems that might confront an ordinariate priest going into a UK diocesan parish, and the Bishop of Shrewsbury had little understanding of what a fuss-and-feathers OCSP priest might be like. This reflects especially on Bp Lopes, as it seems as if his job knowledge is limited and overspecialized, and he seems to have been unaware of possible issues with Fr Kenyon's personal style.

I see a subtext in the account above, that the parishioners at Our Lady's somehow sensed that the personnel move involved in Fr Kenyon's arrival was not in their primary interest, and it was somehow to be in furtherance of Fr Kenyon's circumstances, not their spiritual well-being. The clergy-centered culture in the OCSP is a major factor here. The need for repeated visits to St Luke's by Fr Phillips and the apparent short-notice visit by Bp Lopes to Calgary make me think the problem in Stockport isn't unique.

I think Abp Hepworth, Fr Kelley, and the people and vestry of St Mary's need to hold off on any decisions to join the OCSP until such matters become clearer.

UPDATE: My regular correspondent comments,

Virtually all of the OOLW clergy below retirement age are in diocesan ministry; the UK Ordinariate has no stipendiary positions. But I have read of no situations along the lines of Fr Kenyon's epic fail. Presumably they have mothballed their birettas and gotten with the local program. Of course there will be disappointment when a highly valued pastor has to be moved to make way for an unknown commodity. But the push-back must have been epic.

This suggests to me that the Bishop of Shrewsbury thought he was getting something much more like an OOLW priest, he didn't understand the difference -- and, I'm afraid, neither almost certainly did Bp Lopes.