Let's Play "Travelers' Tribunal" Too!

The website Pistrina Liturgica is currently running a series of articles featuring a “game” called Travelers’ Tribunal, where case studies of traddie priests’ misdeeds are presented, and where the reader of the case study then decides on the appropriate punishment to be meted out to that priest.  It’s a fun game – so much so, that we’ve decided to have a go at it ourselves.  (After all, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery!)  For our “case study,” we’ll pick one about, not stealing, but lying, and one that involves, not one cleric, but two.  We’ll analyze this case thoroughly, to give the reader enough information so as to come up with an appropriate verdict.  Ready to play?  Here goes!

The scene is a traddie church, where it’s Palm Sunday, and there’s a procession going on.  Since the cleric (the church’s pastor) in the procession is (reportedly) a “bishop,” the church’s bell is being rung while it’s going on.  But the bell’s rope gets “stuck,” and the bell can no longer be rung.  The man ringing the bell (a church usher) silently motions what is wrong to the pastor, who nods in understanding.  Meanwhile, another man (a church custodian) tries to fix the problem, but fails.  The procession goes on in silence. 

In a subsequent church bulletin, the pastor makes mention of what happened: “The bells were silent, though, as the rope got caught during their final ringing by a long time and loyal usher…”  Later, he states, “[name omitted], our highly sociable assistant caretaker around the church, perceiving the problem (not the doctrinal issues, but the bells), came running with the ladder to put things right.” [Bold face emphasis ours -- which will be explained later.]

But sometime later, in a subsequent newsletter, the church’s assistant pastor [apparently forgetting what the pastor had said] writes: “When on Palm Sunday 2009 our school principal (also the head usher) tried to get the usher [the “loyal usher” in our case study] to ring the bell at the proper time during the procession, said usher took offense.”  In that same newsletter, he also implies that the usher’s “taking offense” is connected to what he (the assistant pastor) had previously said about the usher’s son some years back during the “Terri Schiavo” affair: “I had inadvertently gored his [the usher’s] ox in 2005, when I wrote an article criticizing a pompous doctor who presumed to pronounce on matters of moral theology. It turned out to be the usher’s son. Ouch! Though I personally apologized to the man for giving offense, it seems he never got over it.”

Now, which one – the pastor or the assistant pastor – is lying?  It turns out, they both are.  One of them, of course, must be lying, because their accounts of the “bell-ringing” incident contradict each other – and two contradictory versions can’t both be right. But it’s fairly obvious that it is the assistant pastor who is lying -- not just because of what the pastor said, but because there are dozens of eyewitnesses who can corroborate what he said.  And it turns out that he lies on two other scores as well: first, his insinuation that the reason the usher didn’t ring the bell was because he “took offense” at what he (the assistant pastor) had said about his son some years back; and second, his claim that he “personally apologized to the man [the usher] for giving offense.” 

In addressing that first lie, we must first note that it was the usher’s job to ring the bell: he did it all the time.  Secondly, it must also be noted that what the assistant pastor said about the usher’s son happened years ago, and that the usher had long since “forgiven and forgotten” it.  So then, why would the usher – who had rung the bell many, many times since without taking offense, suddenly “take offense” this time?   And why would he suddenly recollect something that happened years ago and use it as an excuse not to ring a bell?  Lastly, why would the assistant pastor make such a caustic remark anyway, after the pastor’s seemingly innocuous account of what happened (which, again, was corroborated by dozens of witnesses)?  Did he not notice what his boss had said earlier?

Regarding the second lie (about “apologizing”), it was one of those classic “half-truths”: he did apologize – however, not for what he said about the son, but only for not knowing that he was the usher’s son.  [Actually, it is quite unbelievable that he didn’t know he was the usher’s son, because the son’s and the father’s names are identical – except one is “Junior” and the other is “Senior.”]  At best, lie No. 2 was, as we said, a “half-truth”; but the fact that he made it seem to be an apology for his remarks about the son makes it, in fact, a lie.  This lie shows duplicity; but the first lie – the charge that the usher “took offense” – takes real stupidity.  The insinuation is absolutely absurd.

But we also mentioned that the pastor lied too.  So, when did he lie, and how?  It has to do with our bold-faced emphasis put on “doctrinal issues” earlier: the pastor’s quote was referring to an earlier assertion of his that the usher had left the church congregation for “doctrinal” reasons.  There are two “problems” here: first, at the time of that “assertion,” the usher had given no reasons whatsoever for leaving.  In a short note to the pastor that day, he simply stated that he was leaving, and that he would give his reasons later.  And when he did give those reasons, they were not doctrinal, but had to do with scandalous behavior going on at both the church and its school -- reasons which also caused half the parish to leave as well.

The pastor’s comment about “doctrinal reasons” was, then, a pure fabrication (because, to repeat, no reasons were as yet given) – but it did serve as an “explanation” for the parishioners (who obviously noticed the usher’s absence) as to why he left.  More importantly, the use of the word “doctrinal” implied that the usher had “issues” with the pastor’s doctrinal beliefs – which also implies that either he or the pastor is a heretic (and the pastor knew only too well whose "side" the parishioners were going to take).  The word “doctrinal” was, then, not an innocuous “slip of the tongue,” but a judiciously chosen statement to create a particular impression.

What it also did was to “grease the skids” for further character assassination of the usher – which, of course, was done.  It also explains what the assistant pastor later wrote about the usher “taking offense,” and why: he needed to put the usher in a negative light -- and this was one way to do it.  The assistant pastor, too, might have been hoping that this reason for “not ringing a bell” might – in the minds of the parishioners – “morph” into being a reason for the usher’s leaving as well.  Along with the pastor’s “doctrinal reasons” comment, it was a cockle seed planted to create a particular impression.

But might one dismiss these lies of the pastor and his assistant as some sort of uncharacteristic “anomaly”?  After all, to some people, they might not seem to be real “biggies.”  But if one analyzes them, they are.  (Plus, one must consider that if they’re going to lie about things of a seemingly “trivial” nature, what are they going to do when it comes to “the serious stuff”?)  First, they were lies, and provable ones at that.  Secondly, they were lies meant to deceive the parishioners about the usher – both about his reasons for leaving, and about his alleged reason for “taking offense.”  Thirdly, they were obviously an attempt to slander him (as, indeed, were subsequent remarks in that vein).  But, on close examination, they were also a manifestation of the clerics’ stupidity (especially the assistant’s -- for coming up with such an easily refuted and absurd reason for “not ringing a bell”).

So, in your Travelers’ Tribunal deliberations, you must decide on the evidence before you, and on what charge(s) you should bring: Mendacity?  Duplicity?  Calumny?  Stupidity?  You might also wonder about whether that last charge -- Stupidity -- is actually a charge, or instead a “loophole” for pleading the Insanity Defense.  As for our evidence in this case, we must concede that the charge about the pastor citing “doctrinal reasons” is excerpted from his words in a church bulletin that may no longer be extant (church bulletins are usually not archived -- and we didn’t make a copy).  But the assistant’s charge is still in print.**  It is not only proof of his guilt, but evidence of his mental impairment as well -- for none but a moron would concoct such a story (we wonder, in fact, that he has let it remain in print).

In your deliberations, bear in mind also that the two clerics might not necessarily merit the same punishment.  The assistant, for instance, stands the best chance of pleading the insanity defense.  His punishment might consist of 1) being consigned to an asylum, or 2) being confined to the corner of some school room, and being made to wear a tall, cone-shaped object on his head.  The pastor, however, might find himself the object of more severe treatment, because -- when his followers finally “figure things out,” he might just find himself the object of … a lynch mob.

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**The following is the passage -- excerpted from a newsletter (click here to see full document) written by the assistant pastor -- that gives his “reason” for the bell not being rung.  (Actually, it really doesn’t give a reason; it merely states that the usher “took offense.”  The rest of the passage implies that the assistant pastor’s comments about the usher’s son had something to do with the usher’s “taking offense”; but, here again, why would a years old incident suddenly pop into someone’s head and magically become a “reason” for not ringing a bell – especially when the pastor and dozens of eyewitnesses could attest otherwise?  Again, we re-emphasize, only a MORON would concoct such a story.)  Here is the excerpt:

One of your former ushers got involved. If all this stuff isn’t true, why would he say what he said?

I had inadvertently gored his ox in 2005, when I wrote an article criticizing a pompous doctor who presumed to pronounce on matters of moral theology. It turned out to be the usher’s son. Ouch! Though I personally apologized to the man for giving offense, it seems he never got over it.

When on Palm Sunday 2009 our school principal (also the head usher) tried to get the usher to ring the bell at the proper time during the procession, said usher took offense. Later in the week, he wrote to tell us he was leaving the parish.