I guess I stayed away from the St. Louis news for too long after the New Year. Thus, from the Associated Press via the Springfield News-Leader:

Archbishop ends St. Stanislaus’ status as parish in archdiocese

St. Louis —” St. Louis’ Roman Catholic archbishop has issued a —decree of suppression— of St. Stanislaus Kostka church, ending the historic church’s standing as a Catholic parish in the St. Louis archdiocese.

The traditional Polish parish, which is at odds with the archdiocese over control of the parish’s property and assets, is appealing the suppression, along with last year’s interdict and last month’s excommunication of its lay board of directors and priest.

—We saw it coming,— parish spokesman Roger Krasnicki said, adding that St. Stanislaus has retained a canon lawyer. —We’re doing as much as we can as fast as we can.—

According to church law, a move to —suppress— a parish ends its affiliation to the larger Catholic church.

The decree, dated Dec. 29, but announced in the archdiocesan newspaper today, was delivered Wednesday (Jan. 4, 2006) to the parish’s lay board along with a cover letter from Burke.

…

The move to —suppress— the parish was the latest development in a two-year dispute between Burke and the parish’s lay board of directors over control of St. Stanislaus’ $9.5 million in assets.

The church’s property and finances have been managed by a lay board of directors since its founding 126 years ago.

Since Burke arrived here in January 2004, he has sought to make the parish conform to the same legal structure as other parishes in the diocese and hand over control of its assets. As the parish resisted, Burke responded with increasing pressure —” removing its two parish priests, issuing an interdict denying sacraments to the parish’s board, and establishing another parish as the official home for Polish Roman Catholics.

Last month, Burke declared the board and Father Marek Bozek, the former assistant pastor at St. Agnes Church in Springfield who was hired to serve St. Stanislaus, had been excommunicated.

Krasnicki, an attorney, said it’s possible that suppression might be used as a prelude to a civil attempt to get back the property, but doubted such a move would succeed.

Now, here is the most interesting part of the story:

For more than a century, St. Stanislaus has been the religious, cultural and historical home of Polish Americans in St. Louis. The tradition of self-governance in matters of property and assets dates back to the European immigrants who brought the church to America in the 19th century. But that model has faded over the years as the nation’s bishops have asserted control.

The Rev. William Barnaby Faherty, official archdiocesan historian, said late last month that many of St. Louis’ immigrant parishes closed after descendants of the founders moved to the suburbs.

—But enough of the Polish people stayed to keep St. Stanislaus alive,— Faherty said. —The thought was, ‘who cares about those Poles down there?’ No one bothered about them. They went on their way, kept things alive and spent money on their church.—

Yes, they kept the faith, and were largely ignored by the Diocese, especially when they asked for help.  They probably understood the subtext, which has now been made abundantly clear by Rev. Faherty, an archdiocesan representative: Who cares about you, we’re not bothering with you, go on your way.  Now I can add —“ but ooops you have $9.5 million.  Now its time to care, bother, impede and close —“ just like the rest of the ethnics.

Another thought —“ since I like coining odd phrases, perhaps the nativist influences affecting American Roman Catholic bishops, at the time of the 3rd session of the Council of Baltimore, left an ingrained feeling that —ethics do not count with ethnics—

The Roman Church stands by in amazement at the fact that Hispanic ethnics are leaving in droves for Pentecostal and evangelical churches.  Since Spanish, being a great romance language, is so closely allied with Latin, perhaps they intuit the term Modus Operandi and can see the handwriting on the wall.

Another aside, from KSDK, Abp. Burke was away on retreat at the time the suppression was announced:

Archbishop Raymond Burke is on retreat, but released a faxed statement that said, “It is not possible for St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish to remain a parish of the Archdiocese of St. Louis and, at the same time, to operate completely independently of the Apostolic See and the Archdiocese of St. Louis.”