Memphis

As we’ve written on various aspects of our diocesan governance and the Uniting in Heart plan, a common question, both in the comment section and in our inbox has been: “But what can we do?” Others have expressed that, even if things are indeed in a bad way, who will listen, anyway?

The Rothrock affair has been a catalyst for many. We’ve seen the formation of new lay groups and the meeting of concerned laity across the diocese on this forum, elsewhere online, and in person. Our readers mention reaching out personally to our bishop or to other Church leaders. It has been edifying to see the drive toward prayer and action out of love for the Church.

More painfully, but of equal importance is that problems which have been hidden in the culture of diocesan leadership can now be seen more clearly. And likely there is much more to come.

If you have become convinced that something is amiss, then this is not the time for despondence or bitterness. And nor is it the time for complacency. We are, after all, as one saint said, not called to be successful in all things but to be faithful.

Is there any point to asking for reform? Does the Church ever turn its eye from its larger concerns to help a minor diocese that is badly governed?

Late in 2018, Christopher White of the Catholic publication Crux penned a three-part report on the travails of the Diocese of Memphis, Tennessee. Memphis, though iconic in the American imagination, is a relatively poor diocese where only 3-4% of the population is Catholic (contrasted with Lafayette, where the Catholic population is close to 9%).

Its bishop, Martin Holley, was removed from the diocese by Pope Francis in October of 2018 after a short tenure in which the diocese morphed from a place where the priests ranked among the happiest in the nation into a place of demoralization and upheaval. Holley’s inexorable plans for sweeping change, his tendency to see a black-and-white plan but not the living body that was his local church, to alienate priests and laymen alike, all led to a general outcry. In the end, Holley was removed, not for heresy or for an abuse scandal, but for his management style in which the expressed needs of his priests and people consistently fell upon deaf ears.

White offers his report on the Memphis diocese as an “object lesson” in diocesan governance, a sad cautionary tale:

In a sense, this story is bigger than Holley and Memphis. It’s about how quickly an apparently well-functioning diocese can be thrown into turmoil when a new bishop, for whatever reason, struggles to bring his priests and people in line with his vision . . .

“Memphis under Holley offers object lesson for new bishops everywhere.” CRUX, November 28, 2018.

The ins-and-outs of Holley’s situation were complex. Some of the difficulty seems to have been of attitude and temperament, inability to relate to or respect the local culture and practice already in place, the multiplication of excessive new rules, harshness with clergy, and a desire to remake and revamp the diocese and its institutions entirely through abrupt moves and wide-scale changes. There was also a culture in which those who questioned his decisions in any way were badly treated, bringing many to “a breaking point.”

As White observes:

For many clergy, that breaking point came during Holley’s first Lent, following an announcement that he would be moving two-thirds of his priests to new assignments.

While Holley would later state that he only moved 26 priests, an internal memo obtained by Crux enumerates 43 changes, or just over 70 percent of active diocesan priests.

Several of these priests told Crux their new assignments reflected little understanding of their skills or the make-up of the parishes involved. Of the surprise changes, some priests were moved a year before retirement, an English language priest was sent to an entirely Hispanic parish despite not speaking Spanish, and other priests who had only been in their previous posts for one to two years were uprooted.

By Easter, ink was being spilt throughout the diocese — first via letters to Holley from priests, and then eventually by laity who organized an S.O.S. (“Save Our Shepherd”) campaign. Many of those letters would also be sent to the pope’s representative to the United States, Apostolic Nuncio Archbishop Christophe Pierre.

A subsequent letter sent the following month to Holley by [retired vicar general Monsignor Peter] Buchignani offers a similar assessment, describing, “the complete fracturing of the relationship between the bishop and most of his clergy.”

“In my fifty-one years of priestly ministry, the morale of the priests is worse than I have ever seen,” he wrote.

By July, Father Keith Stewart informed Holley that he was resigning as Director of Seminarians and would be transferring to Nashville.

“Memphis is my home. I was born here, and I always thought I would die here,” he wrote. “Your episcopal leadership has alienated most of the incardinated priests of our local church causing priestly morale to plummet like never before in our diocese’s history.”

Added difficulty was occasioned by Holley’s incardination into his diocese of a new vicar general, Canadian priest Fr. Clement Machado, who soon became the only consultant of the bishop, a gatekeeper across whose desk all matters had to pass (and where many of them went to die).

White notes that:

Chancery officials and priests recalled that Machado was the sole voice whom Holley was interested in consulting on diocesan matters, including the fallout from his decision to move over 70 percent of new priests during his first 6 months on the job.

According to both current and former chancery officials, when efforts were made to push back or question Machado, they told Crux they were written off by the bishop — to the point where it became a verb.

“You’ve been Machadoed,” became a common phrase.

“Memphis’s ‘Dynamic Duo’ a tale of heartbreak and early exits,” CRUX, November 29, 2018

At length, a response came from the Church:

Archbishops Bernard Hebda of St. Paul-Minneapolis and Wilton Gregory of Atlanta arrived in June 2018 to lead a Vatican visitation, by some estimates more than 250 letters had been sent to the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Christophe Pierre, seeking an intervention.

“In the end, management not politics seems key to Memphis meltdown,” CRUX, November 30, 2018.

Though initially expressing a desire to be conciliatory, Holley soon relapsed into his former ways, bringing Pope Francis’ final judgement in the matter. (Since that time, Holley has maintained that his removal was not due to his behavior, but to his having incurred the ire of Cardinal Wuerl some years earlier.)

The story of Memphis is a tragedy in which the relation between shepherd and flock was irreparably harmed. While it is no direct parallel to the story of our own diocese, it does offer some useful insight.

Where the priests or Faithful of a diocese feel their diocese is being harmed, or that they are being treated in a way which is inconsistent with the role given to their Shepherd or which is injurious to faith, the Faithful do have some recourse in the Church. They are not required to remain silent before that which they, with sufficient formation of conscience, believe to be wrong, nor do they have to wait for some more egregious offense, like a sex abuse scandal, to happen before making themselves heard.

In some instances, their Shepherd himself will listen to the concerns of his people. And in some instances where he will not, others higher up in the Church are prepared to do so.

Even were this not the case: do we imagine ourselves to be absolved of the duty to tell the truth?

It is to be hoped that our diocese will achieve a happier ending than that of the diocese of Memphis. If it does, it will likely owe something to the prayers, sacrifices, determination and tenacity of its laity, in response to the grace of God that moves us to desire unity with our leaders, even while standing for accountability and good governance.

This process is already underway, it would seem, in the people of the Lafayette diocese. Stay the course, friends.