Jane Genova: Speechwriter - Ghostwriter

Catholic Church and all its works and pomps

We remember Michael in "The Godfather" renouncing, on behalf of Connie's baby, all the devil's works and pomps.  Now, the tables might be turning on the institution which created that smoke-and-mirrors type language as part of its mystique.  

The Senate rejection of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops's position [and even wording] on abortion might be a sign that the influentials and powerful have decided there's no payoff in playing ball with the Roman Catholic Church.  Some would stretch that to say that public opinion has classified that centuries-old religion as, well, a platform for the devil's works and pomps and must be renounced.

There's been a second-wave of disclosures about not only what occurred in the clergy sex abuse scandal but what Church leaders allegedly were part of the cover-up.  Big names like former Cardinal Edward Egan surface prominently in the 12,000+ pages of discovery documents associated with the clergy sex abuse lawsuits released to the media by the Connecticut Diocese of Bridgeport.  Lousy public relations judgment, the Diocese legally fought the release for years.  It even, on its own dime, made three trips to the U.S. Supreme Court to keep those documents sealed.  So, what public relations agency is advising the Diocese and the Church in general?  All the wrong moves, folks.

Then there are the incidents seemingly made for late-night-talk show jokes.  At St. John's Catholic parish in Darien, CT [located in the Diocese of Bridgeport] the head priest the late Father Michael Jude Fay embezzled more than a million dollars of Church funds to squander on his gay lifestyle.  He died in the same prison housing Bernie Madoff. 

Such a high-profile defeat on abortion is a loss the Church cannot absorb.  It made what could be perceived as an end run to preserve its hold on the minds, hearts, and souls of Americans.  That didn't work.

A recovering Catholic [I have my good days and bad days] I recently published a novel in which the dominant and lesser players are Catholics.  Here you can take a peek at the YouTube video.  And here for a dark comic read are the first two chapters Download FGFGchapters1,2.

Question:  Should American Catholicism sue its public relations and policy advisers? 

Full disclosure:  In 2004, I did some freelance work for the Diocese of Bridgeport.

No-Fail Media Coverage: Pick a fight with Catholic Church or have it pick a fight with you

It's that easy: Take on the Catholic Church or have it vilify you and the media spotlight its yours.  There's more.  It doesn't matter what other weighty stories may be out there competing for attention, including Palin getting tomatoed and the 911 call from Tiger's home.

Astute pols know this.  Today, in Politico.com, Kathleen Kennedy Townsend tells us in an opinion-editorial that "The Conference of Catholic Bishops has lost its way."  Of course, the issue is abortion.  Kennedy-Townsend was Maryland Attorney General from 1995 until 2003.  This fight could be the platform for a political comeback.  You go, Kathleen.

A few weeks back, U.S. Representative from Rhode Island Patrick Kennedy had the good fortune to be instructed by Catholic Bishop Tobin not to receive communion.  You bet, this news and its analysis dominated in Kennedy's home state, top-tier national publications, and international media. 

'Tis the season for magic.  Please, Santa Baby, set a Catholic Bishop against my novel "The Fat Guy From Greenwich" and ban the flock from reading it.  Book sales on Barnes and Noble will do quite well.

UPDATE:

Senators reject the abortion measure in the Health Reform Bill.  This is yet another arrow in the heart of American Catholicism.  Politics and religion are not making happy bedfellows.  If the Catholic Church keeps pushing for influence and power in the political arena it could find the pushback more than it can absorb.

 

Release of clergy sex abuse documents: Second shoe drops

The first shoe immediately dropped when the Connecticut Diocese of Bridgeport released to the media those discovery documents from the clergy sex abuse lawsuits.  They were turned over last Tuesday.  By Tuesday evening we knew that Edward Eagan, later a Cardinal, had observed that it was "marvelous" that more priests hadn't been involved in the scandal.

Today, the second shoe drops.  The front page of the CONNECTICUT POST carries that news.  It is that two of the clergymen who "hid abuse [are] still working" in the diocese.  The subhead of the article written by Daniel Tepfer reads:

"As the Bridgeport diocese tries to move beyond the priest sex abuse scandal, the release of 12,600 pages of documents has revealed the roles key diocesan leaders played in the cover-up.  Two bishops involved in the concealment are gone, yet two key church leaders, Monsignors William Genuario and Laurence Bronkiewicz, remain.  Critics and those abused by priests are asking: If the diocese is truly committed to reform, why are these two men still there?"

The article goes on to document their failure to take effective action.  Tepfer has praise for the Diocese's current leader Bishop Lori.

Full Disclosure:  In 2004, I briefly did some freelance consulting for the Diocese of Bridgeport.

Unsealing of Clergy Sex Abuse Documents: Egan's Agony in the Garden

Yesterday, just at the Connecticut Superior Court in Waterbury ordered, the discovery documents from the clergy sex abuse lawsuits in the Diocese of Bridgeport were unsealed.  Those who were targeting retired New York Cardinal Edward Egan as mishandling and/or covering up that abuse of children feel they now have their smoking gun.  This will be Egan's agony in the garden.

Associated Press writer John Christoffersen reports, for example:

"'These things happen in such small numbers,' Egan said in a 1999 deposition.  'It's marvelous when you think of the hundreds and hundreds of priests and how very few have even been accused, and how very few have even come close to having anyone prove anything.  So it is not a commonplace, by any means at all.  It's a unique and unexpected occurrence.'"

The attorneys representing the victims of the abuse did not agree with Egan's perception of the situation.  One of those lawyers is Jason Tremont.  Christoffersen quotes him as opining:

"I believe that Bishop Egan was aware - when he took over and during his tenure - of these complaints, yet in some circumstances let the priests continue and was very aggressive in his defending of these cases and re-victimizing the victims."

Rather than a resolution of anything, these documents could be causing a tipping point.  The victims's attorneys contend that the Catholic Church must also be continuing to hide from the court of public opinion and the court of law other key material relating to abuse of children by those associated with the Church.  They could be priests or those supervised by those priests.

Tuesday was likely a very sad day for devout Catholics.  Will they have a crisis of faith?

Patrick Kennedy Envy: If only Catholic Church would mess with me

Controversy sells.  And a religious controversy sells better than a secular one.  Think how the Christian Right so quickly gained influence and power.  Unfortunately, it got intoxicated with its success. 

Patrick Kennedy, issue management in his genes, won't make the same mistake.  Catholic Bishop Tobin handed the Rhode Island U.S. Representative a gold mine of publicity, present and future, when he informed him not to receive the sacrament of the Eucharist.  That was because of Kennedy's public policies stances, particularly abortion. 

Moreover, the controversy blossoms ever so nicely as the Catholic Church, both in the U.S. and Ireland, gets hammered with negative coverage in the clergy sex abuse crisis. Incidentally, after the Connecticut Diocese of Bridgeport releases to the media, under court order [here's the Diocese's statement on that], the 12,000 pages of discovery documents from the 2001 settlement of lawsuits related to that, the weary nation/world is bound to turn its eyes to the young man from RI who stood toe-to-toe with Holy Mother Church.

Not one sane professional needing something promoted doesn't have extreme Patrick Kennedy envy.  How we long to have a seeming bully like the current Catholic Church after us.  Its brutal Goliath tactics seem to be just where they were in Martin Luther's day.  And no surprise the reformer turned to caricature and cartooning of the Big Bad Church.   As history shows, that did the trick.

Can I irk the Church to ban my first novel "The Fat Guy From Greenwich?"  Its dark ironic tone peeks at the underbelly of all religion, but especially the Catholic brand on the Gold Coast of CT, in fact right in the Diocese of Bridgeport [Full Disclosure: Back light years ago in 2004, I did some freelance consulting for the Bishop].  That peek also includes the institution of capitalism.  Here you can peek at the peek on YouTube. 

These online video trailers are created, crazy cheap [$300 -$500], by Jewish-American vendor Mindy Schwartz of Full Circle Admin Services.  Unfortunately, the Church has it Schwartz will not be allowed into heaven. 

Should the Church declare "The Fat Guy From Greenwich" naughty, not nice this holiday season, like one of the characters in the novel, I will carry a life-size cross through the streets.  And, exactly like that character Ralphie, I will take that journey of the cross every year at the same time.  Schwartz, the media, et al. will bear witness. 

Here are the first two chapters of "The Fat Guy From Greenwich" Download FGFGchapters1,2.

No, Catholicism isn't marketable these days, is it?

Brad Gooch tells us all about how the intellectuals in Flannery O'Connor's times - the 1950s - were converting to Catholicism, with great fanfare.  Gooch's new biography of the novelist "Flannery" sends off scents of incense and sounds of Gregorian chant. 

And way into the early 1960s when I did time at women's Catholic institution Seton Hill, Greensburg, Pennsylvania, we heard in English Literature courses about how the greats such as  T.S. Eliot became a Catholic.  As I reflect back to those classes, before which we actually said a prayer [I suppose to thank God for our intellectual goodies rather than daily bread], I wonder why I didn't ask the professor such as JoAnne Boyle [currently the president there] or Sister Miriam Joseph Murphy, "Why would Eliot do a reactionary thing like that?"

Now, not much to do with Catholicism is marketable.  The big conversions have been to Eastern lines of spirituality, as when Leonard Cohen went off to a Buddhist monastery and his financial manager embezzled his millions. 

"What do you think of the angle of childhood molestation, since there's so much in the media about Catholic clergy sex abuses?"

That's what I asked a colleague.  I was digging for fresh ways to position my first novel "The Fat Guy From Greenwich." Here's the YouTube playing out the capitalism angle.  This video trailer was created by Mindy Schwartz at Full Circle. 

"NO NO NO."

That was her answer. 

Yeah, Catholicism doesn't move intellectual lines of thought or books these days.  Like, yeah, no one cares.

So, I have decided to do an e-media release via PR WEB on how making a buck, never mind success, is no longer the game of a fine education, a pedigree network, sucking up on the job, and paying one's dues.  "The Fat Guy From Greenwich" shows that the marketplace is set up to recognize and reward cunning, risk-taking, imagination, and self-confidence.  Suck-ups not let in.  Those who hire us full-time and as vendors want aggressive strategic partners with a touch of the gambler.  

In short, my type of professional is in style, finally.  The bookmakers at Seton Hill gave me lousy odds for even staying off the breadline.  Sweet.   Yes, I am forwarding promotions for "The Fat Guy From Greenwich" to the powers-that-be at that institution of higher learning, ranging from President Boyle to heads of the appropriate academic departments.  My creativity requires I tear open wounds.

A Flannery O'Connor Thanksgiving

With all the negative publicity pounding the Roman Catholic Church, this is the perfect time to have a Flannery O'Connor Thanksgiving.  [See the new bio of her by Brad Gooch.]

A contrarian thinker and writer, O'Connor had a ball focusing on the oddness and wounds of a Catholic girlhood.  Doing likewise is especially perverse this year when everyone is frantically attempting to find and foist on everyone else solid reasons to be thankful.  Yeah, it's been that hard a year.  Slim pickings in the gratitude department but folks are sure trying.

So, I will not.  Like O'Connor, I recognize that it provides endless entertainment to myself and to others to reflect on how it was to be a female in the line of fire of the Catholic powers-that-be.  Without that, I would never have gotten to understand the enemy, therefore to later outwit it.  Of course, the enemy was to come in many many shapes, as this video shows here.   But, I am proud to say that I've seemed to pin 'em all down in my new novel "The Fat Guy From Greenwich."  

No question about it: Resentments and wounds are wonderful leftovers from a life.  On holidays, after the girl and boy scout types leave, we serve them up cold, with ranch or, better yet, homemade Italian dressing.  We are bug-eyed that we survived all that, are alive, and haven't managed to heal much at all.  

Tipping Point in New England: American Catholicism

Since Sunday, American Roman Catholicism has received considerable media attention in the New England area - which quickly went national and global. 

First it was the report by U.S. Congressman Patrick Kennedy, who represents parts of Rhode Island, that Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin barred him from receiving the sacrament of the Eucharist.  The reason was Kennedy's positions on policy issues, particularly his support of abortion. 

Those who lined up with Kennedy contend this is a violation of the separation of church and state.  Recently, Tobin was on a popular radio show, hosted by former Providence, RI mayor Buddy Cianci.  Obviously, the Bishop is keeping the dispute alive.

Today, here in Connecticut, on the evening news it was announced that the state's Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport has secret files about grim allegations of sex abuse of children.  In THE HARTFORD COURANT, Dave Altimari reports that the Diocese in a brief which had been filed earlier with Waterbury Superior Court:

"admitted that they have secret files detailing 32 allegations of sexual abuse of children by eight priests assigned over the last 40 years to a single parish - St. Theresa in Trumbull."

That brief had been submitted seemingly as a legal tactic by the Diocese to keep sealed more than 12,000 pages of discovery documents from 23 clergy sex-abuse lawsuits.  When the Diocese settled those lawsuits in 2001, a condition was that the material remain sealed.  The media, including THE HARTFORD COURANT and THE NEW YORK TIMES, requested through the courts access to that material.  They won.   Since then the Diocese has been attempting to block that.  That has included three separate appeals - denied - to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The allegations of such sustained sex abuse in one parish can reinforce what might be disclosed when the discovery documents are available to the media.  The Waterbury Superior Court specified December 1, 2009 as when that access will be given.

Could the cumulative impact of these developments be the tipping point for American Catholicism?  The healing which occurred after the BOSTON GLOBE broke the clergy sex abuse could come undone.  What will happen to the faith of America's Catholics?

Recently I have published my first novel which focuses on Catholicism on the Gold Coast of Connecticut.  It also incorporates my own fictionalized account of my Catholic girlhood in New Jersey.

Full Disclosure: In 2004, I did a few months of freelance communications consulting for the Diocese of Bridgeport.

Patrick Kennedy v Catholic Church

Is this toughness posturing before the coming crisis of the unsealed court documents on Catholic clergy sex abuse? 

Today, U.S. Patrick Kennedy reports that the Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin told him not to take the sacrament of communion.  That is, says the AP coverage of this, because of Kennedy's policy positions that conflict with Catholic dogma.  One of them is his pro-abortion stance.  Kennedy didn't say if he is complying with Tobin's order or not. 

If this is a public relations strategy on the part of the Catholic Church I wonder what PR expert or agency is doing the advising.  Kennedy right now is hot.   Public sympathy is with him after the death of his father.  And he's obviously going places where the church could use his help.

Ghosts of Catholic-Girls Christmases Past

 "She will get a ring."

"Last year she came back from Christmas with vestiges of a black eye.  Her father is a drunk, you know."

"Who do you think will do 'it' over the holiday?"

There are so many ghosts of a Catholic-Girls Christmases Past, particularly when we were encased in the faux-joyful, repressed lust confines of women's Roman Catholic College.  The site of my four Catholic-Girls Christmases was Seton Hill in Greensburg, Pennsylvania.

Those years were 1963 through 1967.  Feminism, the war in Viet Nam, race relations - none of that put a dent in the preoccupation with appearing well-adjusted, marriageable material and happy. 

The letter from the Admissions Office instructed us to bring ball gowns.  They would be used to celebrate Christmas at Seton Hill's gala dinner for which we got to invite a faculty member.  A girl from Richmond, Virginia the late Becky Mitchell even brought a hoop for her gown.  Years later she recounted her regrets in leaving it in some closet in The Admin Building. 

Pre-Oprah no one ever ever ever disclosed how awful the 12 days of Christmas holidays were going to be back in our own homes.  In addition to the usual ethnic alcoholism were mothers going through menopause w/o medication or support, relatives pestering us about our weight [it was always about weight], fathers demanding that we pick up a teaching certificate to be safe, and our own terror that we would be forced to return to our home towns after getting our degree and no ring and no job.

The Sisters of Charity, who ran Seton Hill, had their pets decorate the chapel, their offices and the corridors.  Celebration of the coming of Christ was everywhere.  Of course, the big mess of a personality I was I couldn't even figure out how to feign the spirit of the season.  The dean of woman Sister Zoe Dorsa, who later fled the Sisters of Charity, called me in.  She asked me if anything was wrong and told me "You're a diamond in the rough."  I held it together until 1970 when I had a whopper of a breakdown.  But it wasn't until 2003 that I realized I did not had to recognize Christmas or celebrate it. 

A few Christmases ago I self-published my book "Our Emotional Intelligence"  Download CUsersjasneDocumentsjg.  I dated the publication day December 25, 2007 and sent it to the Library of Congress for copyright.  A clerk at the Library of Congress called me to question if December 25th was indeed the publication date.