By Their Fruits You Shall Know Them: Part 1

Outside its myopic circle, the Dolan-Cekada-Sanborn cabal is pretty much regarded as an intellectual backwater: Flammenwerfer Don’s Brooksville puppy mill cranks out incompetent, simplex simpletons, while Dannie and Tony ply their snake oil on SGG’s street-carnival-and-freak-show crowd, for whom a donkey in a Palm Sunday procession represents a dazzling spectacle, and for whom Tony’s juvenile WHH is “profound stuff” – and who lap up whatever tent-revival crap these two store-front hillbillies throw at them.  They are two small-time hucksters -- consumed with their own self-importance, blinded by their own arrogance, and oblivious to their own ignorance -- whom the rest of traddielnad has long since written off as non-entities.

Not only are their arrogance and ignorance legendary; but their record of misconduct and misdeeds is also well-known (and well-documented) throughout traddieland (and corroborated by scores of individuals, including several traditional clergy).  But the thing that really sets them apart, more than anything else, is their inordinate preoccupation with MONEY – with any form of material gain.  Everything else is subservient to it, and is, in fact, all geared towards that goal: maximizing material gain.  Whether it’s putting on a three-Mass funeral extravaganza for a major donor’s deceased wife, or bad-mouthing some “rival” who is encroaching on their “turf,” or trying to peddle one of Tony’s literary flops, the underlying reason for everything they do is always MONEY.

Back around the turn of the millennium, when SGG conducted its “building campaign” to replace its old facility (in Sharonville, Ohio) with a new one, Dolan and Cekada expected their congregation of less than a hundred families to donate about five million dollars towards the new project – a totally unrealistic sum.  (This figure does not include the land donated beforehand for the new facility – valued at $400,000).  The Sharonville church, by the way, was paid for; but Dolan wanted a new church -- a “sermon in stone” – as well as a new school building to replace the old church’s crowded school, which was housed in its basement.  A new facility might have been justified, if it weren’t for the fact that the old church was perfectly adequate.  As for the “school in the basement,’ a building next door to the church would have provided for a more-than-adequate school (and would have freed up space in the church for expansion) -- and it was available, for less than what the new facility’s land alone was valued.

As it was, the “building campaign” had to be drastically curtailed, even though one family (SGG’s main benefactor at the time) chipped in well over a million dollars (plus donated labor).  Even with that help, the rest of the parish just couldn’t meet the unrealistic goals set by Dolan and Cekada.  The irony was that Dolan never got his “sermon in stone” anyway -- the school’s gymnasium became the “church”; and the school, built much larger than it needed to be, ended up housing only a handful of students -- half of whom were the school principal’s kids.  (In its first ten years of operation, the school graduated only one student outside the principal’s family.)  Almost half the rooms in the school ended up being used to store pack rat Dolan’s surplus junk.

And, although the congregation did not get their “sermon in stone,” Dolan and Cekada did get their three-climate-zone, 2000 sq. ft. rectory (see Extreme Makeover, Brain-dead Edition), plus a “convent” (at least, that’s what the parishioners were told it was) that ended up housing priests, not nuns (there were three nuns: one died, and two left SGG in disgust).  And, of course, Dannie and Tony did not give up La Dolce Vita: gourmet meals at their favorite restaurants, “sabbaticals” to the desert Southwest, and “apostolates” to sunny Latin America (in the winter) and to Europe (in the summer).  And it is interesting to note that, even in today’s “hard times” (their million-dollar main benefactor – along with half the parish -- left SGG in disgust after the 2008-09 school scandals), Dannie still managed to go on two “apostolates” to Latin America this past winter (even though he didn’t have money to pay SGG’s heating bills at the time).

The dynamic duo’s preoccupation with money pervades everything they do; even providing the school was done with that in mind: the school was supposed to be a “drawing card” – to make SGG look like a “full-service” parish, and thus to draw (and keep) parishioners with school-age kids (plus, to provide a retirement nest egg for the school principal and his family, half of whom were either on the school’s or the church’s payroll).**  Now there is nothing wrong with having a school; many traddie churches have schools.  But SGG’s “school” was an afterthought – a sub-standard institution staffed with sub-standard personnel.  (Actually, there were a few who were well qualified -- and most of whom taught for nominal wages (or even gratis); but most of them were dismissed – for having opposed the scandalous events of 2008-09.)

The kinds of things that Dolan and Cekada have done (and still do) should serve as red flags for Catholics who are wanting to know what (and what not) to look for in their clergy: Do they continually exhort their parishioners to “sacrifice” and “offer it up” while they themselves live in luxury?  Are their schools well run (and accredited), or are they just "stage props" thrown together to attract business?  Do they spend an inordinate amount of time (and money) traveling on “church business” – especially to warm climates in the winter and places like Europe in the summer?  Do they “guilt trip” their parishioners about “not giving enough”?  Is MONEY the thing on which they seem to focus all the time?  If your clergy meet or exhibit any of these criteria, then watch out.

Money, to be sure, is the sole reason for Dolan and Cekada's "being in business.”  But how were they able to accumulate their money?  More importantly, how were they able to convince people to give it to them?  The answer is simple: by convincing them that “we’re the only game in town.”  That ploy -- which Dannie and Tony have used quite extensively – is, unfortunately, a tool not only used by them, but one commonly used throughout traddieland. Next to money, it is perhaps the second major “watch-out” for people to consider – and one which we’ll be looking at next.  Stay tuned.

_______________________

** The school principal, who was supposedly “fired” after the 2008-09 school scandals, was re-hired within a week – and his newly appointed replacement then inexplicably sacked.  Not only was the principal was retained, but so were his wife and at least one of his daughters (as teachers), even though the daughter was only a high school graduate – of SGG.  Besides that, at least three of their other children were on the church payroll.  As for being rehired (after having been “fired”), the principal is reputed to have said, “They can’t fire me; I know too much.”