The Bell Brothers: "Ding" and "Dong"

A recent Pistrina Liturgica article mused about some comments that Daniel Dolan had made in his Bishop’s Corner column (in SGG’s Sept. 21, 2014 church bulletin).  Dannie was lamenting the fact that “Crumbs left in classrooms, and cups of coffee spilled in the school wastepaper baskets create unnecessary Monday morning work for our teachers, who already have so much to do.”  “The old discipline,” he continued, “of eating neatly, and in one place, is a precious one to pass on to our children. Encourage them as well, by word and example, to clean up after themselves.”  Later in his Corner, he quoted the late Bishop Sheen as saying, “Everything in the American home is controlled with a switch, except the children.”  Dannie then commented: “Remember the gentle use of a switch which forms part of the seemingly very successful ‘To Train Up a Child’ program?”

Dannie’s mentioning about “the mess left in the classrooms,” after which he exhorted parents to encourage their children to “clean up after themselves,” seemed to imply that it was the children who were responsible for making this mess.  But Dannie also mentioned something about “cups of coffee spilled in the school wastepaper baskets.”  Well, we have a question for Dannie:  Was it children who left those coffee cups?  The obvious answer is that it was adults who left them.  So then, Dannie, why did you single out the children to “clean up after themselves?  And, subsequent to that, why did you bring up the subject of “the gentle use of a switch” to use on children?  Were you implying that this is the appropriate action to take if they don’t “clean up after themselves”?  And if so, why aren’t you recommending it for those sloppy adult coffee drinkers too?

Pistrina wondered (as does this writer) whether Dannie’s reference to the use of a switch (after his prior comments) had any connection with them, or was it simply a veiled longing on his part for the corporal punishment of “the good old days” back in 2008-09 (which caused half the parish to leave in protest).  Whatever the case, the article drew an adversarial comment from one of its readers, who protested: “What’s wrong with aching nostalgia for the use of a switch?”  The anonymous commenter then went on to quote several “spare the rod and spoil the child” passages from Scripture that approved the use of corporal punishment, and then implied that the article’s author was against corporal punishment, adding, “it’s obvious you [i.e., the author] weren’t spanked enough as a child.”

Well, we’d like to point out to “Anonymous” a couple of things: first, the article said absolutely nothing about opposing corporal punishment; it simply asked if Dannie’s talking about it signaled a yearning to return to pre-2009 school policy, when INAPPROPRIATE corporal punishment was the order of the day, such as, beating a boy on his behind with a wooden paddle -- until the paddle was BROKEN – for missing a homework assignment.  [It’s interesting to note Dannie’s mentioning “the gentle use of a switch” in his Corner, when he knew all about this incident, in which neither was a switch used – nor was it “gentle.”]   We’re also talking about inappropriate non-punishment.  Compare what that boy got with the “punishment” that other boys got for watching porn and animal torture videos on the SGG school’s computer – that is, no punishment at all.  Or compare that with the “punishment” an SGG student got for impregnating a girl at the school – again, no punishment at all.  (In fact, this boy was later feted, in a subsequent SGG Sunday bulletin, for his expertise at playing the organ.)

Why did the one boy get thrashed with a wooden paddle simply for missing a homework assignment, while those “other boys” got away scot free with something that merited much worse punishment?  It’s simple: the boy in the first example was NOT the SGG school principal’s son, and those “other boys” WERE.  There were, to be sure, many other examples of “inappropriate” corporal punishment at SGG’s school – enough to drive half the parish away – which are all documented, if “Anonymous” would only take the trouble to check. Or perhaps, in lieu of doing that, he might instead prefer to be beaten with a wooden paddle (until it breaks) to see whether or not that gives him an “aching nostalgia for the use of a switch.”  But, of course, he won’t do either, because he is just as big a phony and hypocrite as Dannie and Tony themselves.

That’s what SGG is all about: Hypocrisy.  Double standards.  It champions the brutalization of innocents while defending sick martinets.  It rewards duplicity, and punishes virtue.  It follows the law’s letter, but ignores its spirit.  It mocks justice, and shuns truth.  It’s the cult mindset; and, unfortunately, it trickles down from shepherd to sheep.  For instance, the same boy who was beaten with the wooden paddle was also mistreated by one of SGG’s parishioners.  This boy and his brother, who boarded for a while with that parishioner, were punished by him one day for “making their beds improperly.”  Their punishment was this: the man awakened them at 3:00 A.M., then made them say the rosary on their knees. That is, the rosary was used as an instrument of punishment. 

These boys, who have since left SGG, have – understandably -- also lost their faith.  They no longer go to church – any church. And their story is not unique: many of SGG’s young have rebelled against the fanaticism of parents who have applied SGG’s cultish precepts, and have consequently abandoned the faith.  (In more than one case, even parishioners’ spouses have left them.)  They have seen through the hypocrisy and falseness, and have seen it for the grotesque caricature of Catholicism that it is.  And those fanatical parents and/or spouses?  They can take empty solace in the fact that they helped drive their loved ones away from the Faith.  By emulating the cult-masters’ behavior, they have endangered those souls – and their own.

But that is the legacy of the cult mentality: whomsoever it touches, it taints.  It turns people into “sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal,” for it drains them of that one thing essential to salvation: charity.  That is what “Anonymous” lacks, for he gratuitously attacked the Pistrina article’s author, wrongly accusing him of being against corporal punishment (even though he had no proof to back up that claim), then suggested that the author should have got more spankings as a child – after which, he sanctimoniously offered an assortment of biblical quotations as “proof” for his accusation.

If “Anonymous” had had any foreknowledge of what happened at SGG back in the “school scandal” days, he probably wouldn’t have made the comments that he did.  Or would he?  In gratuitously attacking the Pistrina article’s author, his comments followed a pattern that had a familiar ring to them:  intentionally misinterpreting the author’s point, then going off on a tangent to accuse him of something else – the old “straw man” ploy.  This, coupled with a speculative comment he made about the author’s identity, betrays the commenter’s identity: he is probably none other than that “Vaudevillian Viper” himself: Antonius Balonius. 

If it is you, Tony, you might then want to cut your losses and clam up, before you embarrass yourself even more -- because, Tony, you’re an amateur.  Neither do you have the brains to pull off your argument, nor – more importantly – do you have the truth going for you.    However, we are grateful that you (and your boss) don’t keep silent, since your bungling words and deeds provide us with a constant source of fresh material about which to expose you for what you are.  The two of you, “the Bell Brothers,” incriminate yourselves every time you open your mouths.  You are “the gift that keep on giving”!