Beloit Catholic parishioners are planning to protest Madison Bishop Robert Morlino's decision to fire a layworker by not giving money to the Annual Catholic Appeal. Below is a news release from the Call for Action Catholic group:
Bishop Morlino has announced his decision not to reinstate Ruth Kolpack, the church employee he fired in March over her masters' thesis on inclusive language.
In response, Ms. Kolpack's supporters are asking fellow Catholics to respond to Bishop Morlino's Annual Catholic Appeal fundraiser by sending in their appeal envelopes without money and with the words "Reinstate Ruth."
Ms. Kolpack has also been in consultation with a canon lawyer.
"I am exploring my legal options," said Ms. Kolpack, "because I am just one of 30,000 other lay ministers in the United States who can be fired at a bishop or priest's whim without any recourse. I have to take a stand not only for myself but for my fellow lay ministers who do not have any workplace protections."
"There is a long history of Catholic social justice teaching that supports workers' justice," said Ms. Kolpack, "but when it comes to living out these rights in the church, we are denied them: the right to unionize, the right to see one's personnel file, the right to address a wrongful termination. I pray taking action on this issue will bring us one step closer to worker's justice in the Church."
Jim Andrews, a parishioner at Ms. Kolpack's church and organizer of her campaign, said "We are asking Catholics in the Madison Diocese to withhold their funds from the annual appeal until the Diocese reinstates Ruth and creates a worker justice policy in line with Catholic social justice teaching. We do this for Ruth today. We do this for the liturgist who was fired last year. We do this for the lay minister who could be fired tomorrow."
"This diocese has suffered a series of unjust firings by Bishop Morlino," said Andrews. "It is an embarrassment to our faith and contradicts the long tradition of workers' justice for which our church stands."
The U.S. Bishops document, Economic Justice for All, states: People have a right to employment. Workers have a right to wages and other benefits sufficient to sustain life in dignity. The dignity of workers also requires adequate health care, security for old age or disability, unemployment compensation, healthful working conditions, weekly rest, periodic holidays for recreation and leisure, and reasonable security against arbitrary dismissal"
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Source (WKOWTV)
SV (ED)
For the facts on the case, see the Q&A from the Diocese of Madison: http://www.madisondiocese.org/Portals/0/Kolpack%20FAQs%20-%20for%20Web%205.0.pdf
ReplyDelete1) If Ms. Kolpack had actual grounds for a lawsuit, she would have filed it already.
2) Ms. Kolpack is a public dissenter who "is no longer in full communion with the Catholic Church"(See questions 16-17 on diocesan Q&A). Public dissenters do not have a right to teach the Catholic Faith, much less get paid to do so.
3) This is simply a negative-publicity stunt in attempt to undermine Catholic orthodoxy, and intimidate an orthodox Catholic bishop who is simply doing his job.
Ms. Kolpack and her supporters are severely misguided.
By sheer fact that Ms. KOlpack is a member of the dissenting group Call to Action, that is grounds to remove her from her position. This isn't a question of no grounds for termination, but rather of a bishop who has class enough not to parade her wrongdoings to the public.
ReplyDeleteBishop Morlino is to be commended for his courage in protecting the Truth from distortion and for firing those in leadership positions who refuse to support Catholic Church Teaching. Signatures in support of Bishop Morlino's courageous and necessary actions are being collected at www.SupportBishopMorlino.com .
ReplyDeleteFirst, Ruth has been an acquisitive person as far as power within the parish is concerned. With her overburdened Priest covering two parishes she saw a power vacuum and filled it and has gotten too big for her britches as a result. She's demonstrating extreme hubris by her entirely self-serving actions, if not giving scandal. She's lapping up the attention big time.
ReplyDeleteWorse yet, she's being used by every anti-catholic bigot and Cafeteria-Catholic by their "support" for her. They flock to every cause to embarrass the conventional Catholic Church.
Some say she has "worldwide support". Rubbish! How can people outside the church and even outside this country know enough to condemn Bishop Morlino's action when no outsider, even in Beloit or in St. Thomas can know the facts of the case, because it's a personnel matter?
He's lost confidence in her ability to separate her personal beliefs regarding the Church from her teaching. She's been paid and served at the pleasure of the Church. End of argument and career. Move on.
So now this Jim Andrews is pushing to weaken the Church by asking parishioners to withhold money. That's the motive. Otherwise he'd recommend enclosing a note with the pro-Ruth sentiment to accompany the contribution.
The Devil is clearly at work in Beloit. Open your eyes, people!
We don't know anything about this particular case but the Catholic Church in Ireland play God with peoples lives here in Ireland when they employ them.
ReplyDeleteTwo Parish Secretaries from one Parish in Dublin Diocese were unfairly dismissed under two different Parish Priests. One of the Parish Priest's settled the night before the Unfair Dismissal hearing. He knew he had no case. The other it has been almost a 4 year battle and still on going. The cases were about 10 years apart.
In a Parish in the same town less than a mile away another Parish Secretary was dismissed just before the one who is fighting a long time battle. This Secretary ALSO won her case against her PP. The lady who replaced her when she heard what happened to her predecessor gave in her notice so only stayed 6 months in the job.
She was actually from the Parish where the ongoing battle is still looming and a member of its Parish Council. When the Secretary there was unfairly dismissed the Parish Priest had the nerve to offer the job to her but she turned it down because she did not want to take over a second job from someone who had been unfairly dismissed and she was also a neighbour of the person and on the Parish Council with her. What kind of mentality you might ask had the Parish Priest to ask her in the first place? She had a conscience unlike him!!!!
What is it with these GRUMPY OLD MEN that they think they can run roughshod over their Secretaries?
In the current situation one case has been won with award against the Church, one case is under appeal FOR hearing shortly SO WATCH THIS SPACE and the third case is awaiting a hearing date later this year. We are hoping it will be a "hat trick" for the Secretary and many of her supporters have already done as the Parish above is contemplating stopped paying donations to the local Parish.
The only thing the Church understands is MONEY and if it starts to go down they are not happy. That is the power the laity have to vote with closed wallets and hit them in their bank accounts.
On 12-22-08 I was wrongfully, maliciously & vindictively terminated from my primary job of the past 16 as Director of Liturgy and Music for a RC Church in the Diocese of Brooklyn. I had worked with three consecutive terrific pastors,support clergy and small staff in a wonderful traditional tri-lingual parish in a greatly revitalized area of Brooklyn. The former pastor and a vicar for the Spanish community were transferred with less than a months notice and no consultation or discussion. On July 1st a neophyte Haitian born priest (45y.o. & ordained less than 6 years with no administrative experience) was appointed. He has destroyed the parish and programs in the parish and driven parishioners away left and right. Despite letters and communications of complaints and concerns to the Bishop as early as August, nothing was done and the priest was installed in October. People did not receive responses until November when the Bishop placed the situation into the hands of the area vicar. On 12-22-08, I was terminated by this priest with no warning and I was only offered 2 weeks of severance pay (after 16 years) and I lost my health coverage less than two weeks of my termination. The cobra was so high I could not afford it. I was not given a verbal or written warning or reason for my firing. In fact this man had the nerve to tell me he thought I was a "fantastic musician" when he fired me. I've been a professional in sacred music for over 35 years. I have many fine reference letters and just the letters from the previous pastors would indicate that something is very wrong regarding my termination. I was always treated with respect for my knowledge, experience, training and expertise in my field. I was also treated with kindness and appreciation. Not so by this know-it-all-controlling new pastor, who is obsessed with mega church non-Catholic worship & music and feels the Mass should be "entertaining."
ReplyDeleteHe thinks drum riffs and rolls and cymbal crashes to punctuate parts of the mass and spoken word is perfectly acceptable. When other clergy and religious(along with parishioners) can't stand this man and some even call him bi-polar and a former fellow seminarian says he was whacky in seminary, something is seriously wrong with the church and the Bishop to allow someone such as this to pastor a church. Parishioners call him "rude", "abrasive","dictatorial" and "completely lacking humbleness". They have either left the parish and gone to other churches or they will not take the Eucharist from him, receiving from the Vicar or lay Eucharistic Ministers. As for me, I've not recovered from the loss of my job and being away from a parish and people I loved and was dedicated to. Being over 50 makes my situation even more stressful and even scary. It is difficult to find jobs in nearly every area of the job market. People who have jobs are mostly staying put. I can only say I am so sad for this wonderful parish and the few staff who are left in what could have been a Renaissance for the parish in this newly revitalized neighborhood. The former pastor was wonderful and excited for the future, as we all were. He should have been there to complete another 5 years. That would have been great for the parish and neighborhood.
The case of the Parish Secretary dismissal is similar to the last posting. You were out before you knew what hit you with basically no grounds for appeal to the higher ups in the Church who will back their Parish Priest even if he is a headbanger because Priests are so scarce in Ireland now they will take anyone by the look of things.
ReplyDeleteThe man in question has RUINED the Parish he was put in charge of. It was a united caring Parish when he came. It will be a divided and sorry excuse for a Parish when he leaves in 2 years if he finished his term of 9 years.
Nobody cares. The only ones in favour are yes men and women and he does not care one bit for anything that goes on there. He has from what we know another life that he is more interested in and he condoned porn in the workplace and sexual harrassment of female staff.
Again the Parish Secretary was very involved in Church groups and not alone did she lose her job but was thrown out of those groups without ceremony like this lady above has no rights in her place of worship either. She like this lady was part of the Parish and cared about those she worked with and was highly qualified to do the job she was paid for. Again the Irish case the lady was 55 when dismissed and these jobs do not come around too often.
Obviously this goes to show that corruption, abuse of power and clergy allowed to run roughshod over Parish workers is alive and well on both sides of the pond and nobody does anything about it.
When will all of this abuse end?