BishopAccountability.org
 
  Directors Reject Interdict

St. Stanislaus Kostka Polish Roman Catholic Parish [St. Louis. Missouri]
February 8, 2005

Archbishop Raymond L. Burke has rejected the reasonable and generous offers of St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish and has instead chosen to impose the contemptible penalty of Interdict against the Board of Directors of the Parish Corporation. Archbishop Burke does this not over an issue of faith, but rather over his demand for money and property. The Directors, unanimously and with clear consciences, refuse to recognize any validity to such an immoral, unjust and inequitable sanction.

Archbishop Burke’s harsh act exceeds the ecclesiastical penalties imposed by him against the many accused and convicted priest pedophiles who violated the laws of God and man, and instead hid and denied those crimes helping bring the American Catholic Church to the brink of financial and moral ruin.

The actions of Archbishop Burke, who has steadfastly refused to meet with those he punishes, exceed all bounds of reason and clearly indicate the priority that he places on his own desires over that of the common good of the flock he has been appointed to shepherd. It is about raw power and greed, and not about the teachings of Jesus Christ.

While the Archdiocese will no doubt attempt to continue to disparage the Directors and Parishioners of St. Stanislaus as disobedient and rebellious against his decrees and his selective interpretation and use of “Church law,” it is in fact Archbishop Burke who repudiates his vows to serve the people, in favor of satisfying his own demands for power.

We did not abandon our faith. Archbishop Burke abandoned St. Stanislaus. The Archbishop abandoned St. Stanislaus by removing the priests from the faithful and forbidding the Sacraments at St.

Stanislaus. The Archbishop continues to refuse to even meet with the Board that he now tries to condemn.

Instead of talking and being questioned by the people, he hires a highly paid PR spokesman to spin his demands to the press.

Instead of treating what is sacred as sacred, Archbishop Burke uses the Sacraments as a bargaining chip. He refuses the Sacraments he holds in one hand unless the Directors accede to his demands to put St. Stanislaus’ money and property in Archbishop Burke’s other hand.

In the 1800s, Archbishop Kenrick set up St. Stanislaus as a separate corporation. In the many decades when St. Stanislaus was in financial peril, the Archdiocese would not assist ----- no loans were ever given. St. Stanislaus had to stand on its own. It did so only through the sacrifice, hard work and Faith. Now that the Parish has assets he wants, Archbishop Burke decrees that sacrifice, hard work and Faith by generations of faithful was and is against his interpretation of Church law. St. Stanislaus’ Parishioners do not believe that they are offending God by faithfully operating the church as it has been operated over the last centuries.

Abp. Burke leaves the Directors, in accord with the will of the Parishioners, to take whatever actions are necessary to provide for their own spiritual well being.

The Board of Directors, while always open to discuss the reinstatement of St. Stanislaus Directors and the Parish into the Archdiocese, will not accept the Archbishop’s demands to extort property and autonomous control from the Parish in exchange for the Sacraments of our Holy Catholic Church.

Roger C. Krasnicki
Spokesman for the
St. Stanislaus Board of Directors

 
 

Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.