Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Gated White Diocese in Knoxville Tennessee – New Wave of the Catholic Right’s Future? – Glory Hole of Corruption?


Bishop Stika / Cardinal Rigali of Knoxville Tennessee

This all started when I saw Cardinal Rigali getting good air time on some eyewitness news channel related article that gives good air time or print time to local human interest stories to children, animals at the zoo and or a OMG Real Live Cardinal Living in little old Knoxville Tennessee with all us hillbillies kind of media story. 
Rigali in my previous article was of course spouting what qualities a new pope should have. Whatever on that.
In my previous article, I thought that maybe the new Cathedral “Rectory” and or Bishop’s Palace had not yet been built in Knoxville. Further research thwarts me on finding any real news on the Internet regarding that matter.
So just giving a reread of some standard things like Wikipedia, one sees where Bishop Stika's career soared under the tutelage of Cardinal Rigali in St. Louis Missouri. Bishop Stika of course dealt with aspects of priests as personnel, Vicar General, and their sexual habits (alleged) with children.
It occurs to me that one of two things seems to be needed for promotion in the Roman Catholic Church IMHO. Cash for bribes and Sexual Blackmail and or knowing a lot about the secrets in the Diocesan Priests’ Personnel Files etc. Of course, that may not be the case in this matter. Bishop Stika came up through the ranks on pure merit. Yeah right. LOL
When Philly crime boss Justin “Big Frank” Rigali was forced to resign in July 2011, in the middle of the Local authorities, District Attorney’s Office in Philly having to take over, intervene, clean up the mess of decades long child abuse and child rape in the Philly Archdiocese, exasperated by Rigali being a part time Philly bishop when not in Rome and hanging with the Swiss Guards etc., I quoted in another article at the time that Rigali was retiring to Knoxville:
Rigali is expected to head to Knoxville, Tenn., to visit his best friend, Bishop Richard Stika, who has "built a home for him to get away from it all," said Michael Sean Winters, a blogger for the National Catholic Reporter. Additionally, Rigali will be making trips to Rome as he is still a member of the Congregation of Bishops.
Apparently Michael Sean Winters quoted correctly or incorrectly in the Philly Press was doing his usual fawning Catholic half-assed PR propaganda best. Cheers, Mikey!
Apparently, Rigali was already looking for retirement digs even before his forced resignation in Philly as mentioned in a blog dated June 2010. Knoxville was “delighted” to have a retired red hat coming to Tennessee?
Do read all the many links attached to above article. Makes very good reading about the Knoxville Diocese.
Well looking into how Opus Dei Archbishop Gomez is no doubt giving retired Cardinal Mahony grief in retirement, hoping to suggest a vote, Mahony’s vote, in the papal election in exchange for friendly prison privileges in his L.A. retirement hell. Etc. -
Looking for the mythical Michael Sean Winter’s memorial Rigali retirement home in Knoxville, I see some shuffling around of funds, funding, Cathedral plans, non-plans, rectory shuffling, convent shuffling, new Bishop’s palace architectural plans in Knoxville, - Justin Rigali is or is not somewhat homeless except for digs in Rome and the occasional sleepover in Stika’s bailiwick to save Justin from the wrath of Charlie Chaput in Philly who should have the upper hand here in asking, suggesting who Justin should vote for as pope/ceo of the Vatican Inc..
Somewhere in there is a grant to build the new bishop’s house for Stika/Rigali in Knoxville from a Dan Murphy Religious Foundation in Los Angeles with a lawsuit from a former board member listed below regarding disputed reporting and or value of assets…
Getting back to the previous link above, it would seem that Former Bishop Kurtz of Knoxville may have been involved in middle of a shell game of funding with an archdiocese loan of $11million to build a great medieval church worthy of being a cathedral in the middle of the rich white western suburbs of Farragut Tenn.  The Cathedral Church of St. John Neumann is on a 42 acre campus and is ready for perhaps a college and or seminaries, convents to sprout in the shadow of the Cathedral church.
Saint John Neumann - Farragut Tennessee

A new very richly appointed rectory was supposed to be ready for construction in 2010 at St John’s of a similar rumored budget, later quoted as a misprint, as the new rectory going up next to the old sixty year old modern Vatican II era Cathedral more centrally located to the center of Knoxville. 
Vatican II Era Sacred Heart Cathedral Knoxville
And here is why I used the word shell game for Bishop Kurtz in that the whole thing reminded me of the story I did on Phoenix and the delicate diplomatic long term switching of cathedrals from old urban inner city space from the 1950s and in minority territory to the raging flavor of the month “Rich White Suburb” geographical goal of the Catholic Church in many places in America to replace that old city stuff, that old Vatican II stuff and be on top as a city on a hill in the burbs. (Phoenix's game plan slightly different.)
I have to wonder too with the South involved that the new St. John Neumann Cathedral in Farragut/Knoxville will not be unlike the big plantation house with its colleges and seminaries and nunneries, missionary convents already arrived from Uganda, will receive tithes and adoration from all the brown and Hispanic parishes down the hill and in the valley so to speak. 

                                                                                                                                         (Google maps)

A gated Diocese and or Cathedral – I.D. required to enter the segregated whites only house of God?
That art and or religion imitates politics and the GOP goal to loot the national treasury and build economic fortresses and gated white castle communities is not unlike how the Diocese of Knoxville may be going.
I also wonder too that how maybe Bishop Morlino of Madison Wisconsin thwarted in his attempts to outright build a new cathedral or skim funds off for personal (bribes?) and secret Vatican projects, may in fact be making a large diocese loan at this very minute to build a new mega parish in the middle of some cow pie pasture in Wisconsin that one day will be the new Madison Cathedral.
Without transparency, with tax exempt and tax free status, with religious barriers to civil and secular review of the books let alone review by the peasant laity in the obedient ranks, how much money laundering and cash flows and what not rival the teachings of Jesus, discount those teachings into zero and less than zero in the hearts of the RC hierarchy these days?

Etc. Links and Quoted Material:


Rigali also put Stika in charge of Pope John Paul II's visit to St. Louis in 1999. Marti Aboussie was on the St. Louis Board of Alderman at the time and worked closely with Stika on the planning process. "He'll be a good administrator," said Aboussie, "but more importantly, he'll make an excellent bishop without compromising the pastoral skills that made him a great priest." In 2004, Burke named Stika to be the director of the archdiocese's Office of Child and Youth Protection and delegate to the archdiocese's review board and chairman of its Child Safety Committee. "With the exception of proven, admitted or credibly accused pedophiles, there is perhaps no priest in the archdiocese less qualified, in our view, to be a bishop than Richard Stika," the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests said in a statement Monday. "In his dealings with child sex abuse and cover up cases here, he has repeatedly shown a penchant for secrecy, reckless and half-truths."


Donovan v. Dan Murphy Foundation (2012) 204 Cal.App.4th 1500.  A former director of a non-profit charitable organization sued the organization and its current directors alleging that he was wrongfully removed after he had raised concerns about financial oversight and governance.


2   Roupp and Rewinski were elected as directors after Donovan was removed from the board of directors of the Foundation (Board).


According to the complaint, Donovan first began expressing his concerns in 2008, after the Foundation’s assets had dropped approximately $65 million in value from the previous valuation of $250 million. Donovan’s concerns were shared by two of the seven directors at that time, Julia Schwartz and Rosemary E. Donohue, but were rejected by three other directors, Edward Landry, Richard Grant, and Maria Grant.


The complaint detailed Donovan’s disputes with his fellow directors. First, during a proposed transfer of management of the Foundation’s assets, Donovan sought a review of the transfer by the full Board. Landry and Richard Grant opposed Donovan’s request, and the management of the Foundation’s assets was transferred without a review by the Board. Second, Donovan “demanded” that the Board exercise its responsibilities under the Probate Code to oversee the management of the Foundation’s assets.