However, the fact that Fr Barker is retired from the Diocese of San Bernardino adds an additional factor. A visitor who often helps me with background on clergy formation and personnel issues kindly sent me the following:
Parishes in most dioceses are required to cover appointed clergy salaries through parish income (the diocese cuts the check, but the parish covers that salary). This is usually not the case when the bishop sends a priest to stay at a parish "in-residence", where the priest has a full time chancery position or works for a hospital. Those salaries are covered directly by the diocese or the place where the priest is doing his full time work. In-residence priests may say a mass or two on the weekend (they receive a stipend for those masses from the parish and the parish cuts the check), but they really have no responsibility to the parish.This strongly suggests that the comment "amicus" left at the post on Fr Z;s blog is at best not giving anywhere near the full story. Even if Fr Barker were able to withdraw the principal amount of his retirement fund from San Bernardino and transfer it in some way, or continue to collect a monetary stipend if he were reincardinated, it's highly doubtful he would be able to continue his medical benefit -- and he's close to 80 years old. So either Fr Barker at some point told something to "amicus" that the guy wanted to hear, or "amicus" misinterpreted what he heard and passed it on as a comment.Medical, insurance and retirement are covered by the diocese and the quality of plans vary by diocese. Generally the common wisdom is that since the diocese may cover auto insurance and give you a clothing allowance and in rare instances subsidize the purchase of a vehicle up to a certain dollar amount, you should be banking that money away or investing it on a regular basis to prepare for retirement. That is of course if you want to be comfortable. There really is no reason a priest ordained from the mid 1960's on would be retiring only on his clergy pension.
Because priests are ordained for a local church (diocese) and they promise themselves to that local church and obedience to it's bishops they are expected to remain in that local church for the rest of their lives. If they choose to excardinate to another diocese or join a religious order their pension and their post retirement medical insurance are not portable. If a priest leaves for a religious order, incardinates into another diocese or joins the ordinariate they may withdraw what they put into their retirement account and place it into their new dioceses retirement plan, but they are effectively starting off fresh, they will not have the accumulated matching funds that the previous diocese paid into for them.
Now, I know of priests who decided they wanted to try religious life in a religious community. The archdiocese allowed them to join the order and keep their pension plans with the archdiocese until they formally joined the order by making their solemn profession. In most of those cases the priest came back to the archdiocese within 2-3 years and still had their pension and years of service salary intact.
Whatever the source of the misinformation, it does seem to me that it feeds a "traditionalist" narrative that diocesan bishops are arbitrary and vindictive, and they persecute good and faithful priests. In this particular case, it seems to me that looking at circumstances more closely, the narrative isn't borne out.
I see this narrative applied pretty frequently to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and the Camarillo seminary. My experience with specific cases there, parishes and clergy, as well as Bp Barron, suggests that closer experience simply does not bear out the implications of that sort of narrative. Never just trust media of any sort!
