Three new sems!

CONGRATULATIONS to Chace Olinger, Tony Lopez (yes, there is now a second Tony Lopez in Maryknoll!) and Glen D'Angelo on being accepted for the fall semester in our vocation program!

A word of special thanks, too, to the promoters, vocation ministers and Maryknollers who accompanied these three men in their discernment over the years. Kudos, too, to the Admissions Board (Br. Brendan Corkery, Br. Wayne Fitzpatrick, Fr. Ray Nobiletti and Fr. Ed McGovern) on their decision.

But wait, there's more! There are still three more applications in the proverbial pipeline which will be decided upon in coming months.

Fr. Dennis Moorman has returned from the vocation retreat during Holy week in Jamaica and gives the five retreatants who attended high marks.

So, it is safe to say that the vocation ministers and promoters and sundry Maryknollers did their job. Now it is our turn to show Maryknoll's best side and encourage these men throughout their formation process.

[On a personal note: since Easter Sunday I have been running on reserve power. Literally. At first I thought my wooziness during Mass at the Korean church was the fault of the incense or the summer-like temps we've been having. Go to find out, my pacemaker is nearing its expiration date and, unless I want to near mine as well, must needs go into the hospital on Friday for a "routine" replacement. N'Sha'Allah I will be running on all cylinders come Saturday.]

Rebuttal Part #2

ACTUALLY this is my second rebuttal to John Kaserow's four part rebuttal of the Petition. (FTR, it was not originally the "Veneroso" proposal as suggested by the email subject line that has been circulating of late. I just got tired of the idea being bandied about from several different people and decided we should put it out there and address it.) But I guess it's mine now.

Having had time to reread John's arguments, another one which doesn't seem applicable is #2. The observations of Robert Schreiter notwithstanding, they may apply to the Society as a whole but do not apply to the U.S. Region. Unlike Asia, Latin America and Africa, we are the only region not diminishing. And for the next 10~15 years our numbers will continue growing simply because guys who are older are returning to the U.S. to live here but not join the Retirement Community.

Also there is no extra level of bureaucracy as he suggests. Rather, a Council Member would hold the canonical title of superior to fulfill all justice, while the Administrator and his advisors did just that: administrate.

The core of the problem is indeed the "rush" job, as Kaserow suggests, but it is not the petition that is rushed so much as the actually second round of voting. Having simply repeated the first cancelled ballot minus Br. Wayne, we should have had another round to allow other names to surface before cutting off the number of candidates to the top four.

The current list is untenable by any measure. One man is already overextended, heading a large department full time—a job for which he is superbly qualified—in addition to heading the all-important Centenary committee; another man is beyond retirement age and some question if he has the energy, strength and endurance to lead our sprawling and unwieldy region; the third man is too unknown by the vast majority of men in the Region and vice versa, having spent most of his career away from Maryknoll; and the fourth, a good man all around, yet he is somewhat disorganized.

But in the current system, these are the only four from which we may choose. And we may have to take yet another ballot to resolve.

And if Br. Wayne becomes the overwhelming choice for First Assistant, a position Rome has already said he may hold, what kind of dysfunctional anomaly does that create? And why is this less bureaucratic than the set-up proposed by the petition?

How this will or will not rock the boat and upset the balance of power with other Regions will be the topic of tomorrow's blog.

Enjoy what remains of your Sunday.