Philadelphia Archdiocese selling top properties to cut deficit
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The Archdiocese of Philadelphia will auction off a sprawling beachfront villa in New Jersey to help close a budget deficit. The 11-bedroom vacation house in Ventnor, near Atlantic City, is set for auction on Sept. 15. Villa St. Joseph takes up an entire block and is assessed at about $6.3 million.
The financially strapped Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia said on Monday it will proceed with plans to sell major facilities in an effort to close a multimillion-dollar budget deficit.
The sale includes the archbishop’s residence in Philadelphia, a rural Pennsylvania retreat center and a 19-room beachfront mansion in Ventnor, New Jersey, used by vacationing elderly priests, the Church said.
The archdiocese faces a budget gap estimated at $6 million, a spokeswoman said. It also faces legal costs stemming from a pedophilia scandal estimated at more than $11 million.
“To address the cash flow challenges caused by the deficits, the church is faced with hard decisions,” said Archbishop Charles Chaput in a statement. “It’s similar to what families have to do when their expenses are greater than income.”
Chaput said the archdiocese has been running a deficit for years.
The archdiocese was involved in the high-profile trial of Monsignor William Lynn, who was found guilty in June of covering up child sex abuse, and it faces the possibility of dozens of civil suits in the priest pedophilia scandal.
The spokeswoman for the archdiocese said the legal costs are separate from the budget deficit.
The proposed sales of the archbishop’s residence and the New Jersey shore villa had been announced earlier but were confirmed on Monday. [more]
SOURCE
Reuters via Philadelphia Inquirer
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18 Comments
Oh! Oh! there I go again. My apologies gentlemen. Prior to becomming a Catholic Lady I used to teach sunday school. Sorry..I know,that you know all this stuff, I have just finished posting.
Hey Catholic Lady, I always appreciate your posts. You are obviously sincere and humble and love the Church. I don’t care if you post something I already know — I like hearing it again, having it reinforced, having it valued by someone else other than me.
Once the Archdiocese sells off its properties, it will be in a better position to proclaim the Gospel, using words if necessary.
Looks like it’s time to pay the piper. No tears here!
None here either. Would have been great if all that money would have been spent helping the poor.
AWT — so, when’s the last time you’ve been to Reconciliation?
So; perhaps you will enlighten me as to what you all have done recently to aid the poor.
Do you get the impression there are not very many Catholics on this site.
Yes, Dennis, very few true Catholics here. Catholic Lady is one of them; Andrew is another; Michael is a third. Many others claim to be Catholic, but typically are arrogant enough that they believe they know better than the Church about things such as contraception, homosexuality, and women’s ordination.
Hi Jim. Good to hear from you.
I happen to be one of those Catholics that pays more attention to the teachings of the Bible than what the Pope, Cardinals, Bishops, etc. have to say. They are all only human.
The Bible has virtually no references to sex (I think you could stretch it to around three).
Most of the bible is about helping the poor and disabled.
By the way, and I think you will like this, many of the males in the Bible had more than one wife. Ahh, the good old days.
But, Dennis, if you’re married, you’ll know that marriage involves much more than sex — there most definitely are strings attached.
Been there, done that – twice.
It was fun while it lasted and I have three wonderful children.
I’m single.
With regard to religious beliefs, though, we part company there — I believe and accept everything the Church teaches. Just as Protestants believe the Holy Spirit inspired the writers of Scripture to write inerrantly, Catholics believe that same Holy Spirit inerrantly inspires the leaders of the Catholic Church to inerrantly proclaim dogma.
The Bible is constant but you have to go back to translations that are as close to the original text as possible.
Religious interpretations change from year to year and from church to church.
Very few churches will even have sermons about helping the poor becouse they don’t want to lose their audience.
Actually, Dennis, I hear about helping the poor — heck, every year during mission Sunday we have someone at our church, usually from a third world country, preaching the homily and asking for donations. What I never hear from the pulpit are the words Hell and Purgatory — for the reason you state — the priests are too pusillanimous to preach about such weighty matters. BTW, I have to get ready for evening Mass now, so I can’t continue to post right now.
To have the full understanding of what God says on any given subject, you must consider all that the Bible has to say on that subject. This is called topical study. Begin with good observation, be aware of presuppositions, and recognize the necessity of identifying the authour’s purpose and occassion for writing. Most importantly you need to have a teachable spirit.. Saint Jerome said that “Ignorance of Scripture is Ignorance of Christ” Therefore I can safely say that it is vital that Christians read the Bible extensively and regularly.
The Catechism emphasizes the exporition of doctrine. It seeks to help deepen understanding of faith. In this way it is oriented toward the maturing of that faith, its putting down roots in personal life and its shining forthin personal conduct. The whole concern of doctrine and its teaching must be directed to the love that never ends. Whether something is proposed for belief, for hope or for action, the love of our Lord must always be made accessible, so that anyone can see that all the works of perfect Christian virtue spring from love and have no other objective that to arrive at love.