Monday, May 15, 2017

My Proposal

An anonymous poster made the following comment:  

Dear anon, Guam is the only place on earth where there are several Catholic church buildings in a one mile radius. There are over 20 parishes serving a city size population, most of whose don't even attend Sunday masses. This is unnecessary luxury. Perhaps, 3 parishes in the Northern region (Yigo, Dededo), 7 in the Central and 5 in the Southern (including Yona, Santa Rita and Agat) would suffice.

This is as few as 15 parishes with one or two priests in each, deacon and clerical staff. No more is needed.

The Archdiocese has a lot of room for consolidating the parishes into a less number of Catholic centers, thus saving a lot of resources and money to pay off the lawyers, court fee and the victims.

Anonymous 9:03 am made an excellent suggestion.  However, I believe that there should be more parishes in the northern region because that is where most of the population resides.  The central area of Guam consist mainly of our business, government, and tourist industry; therefore, we do not need 7 parishes in that area. 

However, the number of lawsuits already over-exceeded the assets of the archdiocese, and these lawsuits are expected to increase.  Thus, there would be NOTHING left to save.  Some people claimed that they can rebuild just as our grandparents did after World War II. However, the truth is....because the lawsuits OVER-EXCEEDED the assets of the Archdiocese and CONTINUE TO RISE, then even the structures you rebuilt will be taken away. People today may also not be willing to rebuild because we are not the same generation as our grandparents. An anonymous poster made the comment below, which can be found here.
People may have had to rebuild a church because it was bombed in WWII and be fine with it, but we aren't talking about outside forces beyond our control, we are talking about our own people DESTROYING it, bombing it from within!   
Nevertheless, this is my proposal: 
  1. Do not liquidate any assets at all. The focus should be on getting the law declared unconstitutional by the Judicial branch. Why? Because there is a higher probability that the law can be declared unconstitutional and inorganic due to the problems already outlined by the attorneys. Once the law is declared unconstitutional, that puts a stop on all the lawsuits.   
  2. I like the objectives of the Hope and Healing Program. I believe that the FIRST thing to healing for victims of sexual abuse would be counseling. However, certain procedures need to be put in place first to ensure that people do not abuse this program meant to help those who were truly victims of sexual abuse.  It is already noted that some people in Guam have abused the Food Stamps Program, GHURA, and welfare program meant to help those with little or no income. If some people can take advantage of these government programs, the same can happen to the Hope and Healing Program.  After all, someone has already identified that the testimony of the person claiming to be sexually abused by Monsignor Ziolo Camacho (deceased) may be a false allegation due to the fact that Monsignor Ziolo Camacho was not assigned to the Dededo parish until 1981.      

9 comments:

  1. Diana, if the law falls by constitutional reason then we don't have much to talk about in relation to church assets that won't be in danger. The real issue is what to do if the law stands?! Please, do not take it for granted that the law can be undone.

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    1. Dear Anonymous at 3:03 pm,

      The probability of this law being unconstitutional is very high; therefore, I would not recommend liquidating any assets for now.

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    2. you can't Tim Rohr that 4:13 PM>>>>>Printed-Madame

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    3. Dear Anonymous at 2:54 pm,

      The law is being challenged, and yes, the probability of it getting declared unconstitutional is very high. The Governor of Guam even questioned the constitutionality of the law. It appears that the Guam Legislature was more concern of the election rather than passing a proper bill.

      Delete
  2. Closing parishes does not resolve anything. Closing parishes is like sounding the retreat... Each parish is a bastion of evangelisation. There is the Real Presence of Our Lord Jesus in the tabernacle of every parish church and Holy Masses are celebrated regularly. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that closing parishes is a solution. Keep the parishes going. And no, Guam is not "the only place on earth where there are several Catholic church buildings in a one mile radius." There are plenty more places like that. Do your research before making such statements. I live in a city in Europe which is about as populated as Guam (160-170 thousand), it has less Catholics (even nominally), lower Sunday Mass attendance, and just about as many Catholic churches/chapels/parishes as there are in Guam.

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    1. We are beyond the point of talking about parishes only. We need to talk about schools, as well! The new wave of lawsuits will target Catholic schools. We need to look into the range of tens of millions of dollars to be extorted from schools.

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    2. Well, closing a school is a very different issue from closing a parish. Parishes are the basic cells of the Church. There are many diocese around the world that do not have any schools. There are none which don't have parishes. Close the schools if you must. Keep the parishes going.

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    3. Dear Anonymous at 10:41 pm,

      Closing the Catholic schools will have an impact on the public schools, which is already overloaded with students.

      Delete
  3. Parishes to remain under all circumstances:

    North: Dededo, Yigo
    Central: Agana, Tamuning, Sinajana, Chalan Pago, Mangilao
    South: Yona, Santa Rita, Agat, Inarajan
    At least one additional parish might be chosen in each region.

    There is no rule that each village needs a separate parish church. Look at the number of masses offered. Beyond the Saturday evening vigil, there should be 4-5 regular masses in every church, every Sunday! There is a lot of room for reducing costs.

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