Tradistan’s Favorite Commandment: “The Eleventh”

Editor’s Note:  Continuing in our “countdown” series of articles as we “wind down” our blog, we offer the following, reminiscing about how many times the cult-masters (Dannie, Tony, Not-so-big Don, and Pivvy) have been “caught” trying to “cover their tracks” over the years.  Although they do this sort of thing on a regular basis, the following article highlights some of their more “memorable" occurrences in blowing their cover. 

In answer to comments we received on our last article (concerning winding down our blog)), we at Lay Pulpit stated that, among other things, we wanted to “spend more time with our family,” etc.  Now the thought occurred to us that, in the cult-masters” (and their deputized goons’) minds, that sounds as if we are “retiring from the filed of battle.”  Well, not really.  The fact is, we have won our battle: we have conclusively shown (and proved) what kind of imposters the cult-masters really are; and we have successfully convinced the audience that we need to convince.  So, let the cult-masters (and their goons) think what they will; we really don't care what they think.  We've accomplished our task -- and they know that we have.  Therefore, we'll not waste any more of our words on them; they will never budge.

However (as we said in a previous article), there is nothing wrong with repetition; so we have decided -- in the articles that we have remaining -- to summarize some of the things that we've mentioned in previous articles, for one last bit of “reinforcement.”  In the following article, we have consolidated several examples of how these bunglers have, over the years, repeatedly tripped themselves up in their failed efforts to deceive people.  That said, here is our article…

People hate to admit that they’re wrong – especially when they know they’re wrong. And nowhere is this more assuredly so than in Tradistan.  The cult-masters like to pretend that they’re always right (and that everybody else is wrong), so it’s really catastrophic for them when their wrongdoing invariably gets discovered, and they “get caught.”  In fact, that is their “eleventh’ commandment”:  “Thou shalt not get caught.”   How many times, though, has Dannie (or Tony) engaged in such activity, only to be exposed?

Examples abound – the time back in 2011, for instance, when Dannie and Tony once got caught contradicting each other (because they forgot to “compare notes” with each other about what happened in a “bell-ringing” incident back then): or the time (in 2014) when Dannie tried to disrupt the ordaining of a young man at a rival chapel (in Lawrence, Massachusetts) – and got caught.  (Click here for Pistrina’s original article on this, and here for our follow-up.)  And who can forget Big Don’s trying to cover up the fact that he had written a letter in support of Tony’s depraved position on Schiavo (by removing the letter from his website), only to have it re-surface (on our website -- click here  for letter).  And, oh yes, there’s the time the Pivmeister granted permission for one of his parishioners’ daughters to get a heart transplant (because the parishioner was a big donor) – even though it meant removing the heart from a living “donor” before transplanting it.  (That is, it meant having to kill the “donor” first.)  The Pivmeister hoped that this would “fly under the radar.”  Sorry, Marky, but that subterfuge didn’t work either.  That got found out too.

And then there’s Tony’s shameless slandering of the late Abbot Leonard Giardina (after his decease, when the man couldn’t defend himself).  Tony accused him of being mercenary (when in fact it is Tony who is the absolute epitome of that sort of thing).  He and Dannie (and Big Don) have made a career of bad-mouthing others (and “disqualifying” them for a variety of bogus reasons), when these folks were totally innocent (and no threat whatsoever to these lepers).  Dannie even went so far as to pick on the local power company (Duke Energy), blaming them for SGG’s “excessively high heating bills.”  And, in letters to a disgruntled former SGG parishioner (who left in disgust after the 2009 school scandals), both he and Sanborn tried their best to guilt-trip the man into returning – even accusing him of “dishonoring” the memory of his dead wife.  (See also A Tale of Two Letters) 

This litany could go on and on, but we think that you get the picture.  The real point of our reprising all of this is to point out that not only have Dannie and Tony (and Donny) been doing this for a long time, but that they are so embarrassingly amateurish in how they go about it.  Heretofore, of course, they didn’t have to be “subtle” or “professional” about it: they could get away with anything, because the gullible Gerties would swallow whatever swill they served up – but not anymore.  Now, Dannie and Tony are habitually getting “caught with their pants down” – not only because we’re there to keep an eye on them, but because the Gerties are now noticing too.

Now one would think that Dannie and/or Tony might “wise up” and be a little more “careful” or “subtle” by now.  Oh, they might think they are; but they aren’t.  Dannie’s recent attempts to “pull the wool over the Gerties’ eyes” have all been miserable failures – and downright comical: his “Teacher’s Prayer,” for instance.  In his attempts to cover up the fact that SGG’s “school” is a miserable failure, Dannie manufactured a “Teacher’s Prayer” (at the beginning of the 2017-18 school year) to drum up support for the “school” (and to create the impression that this “Prayer” reflects the “school’s” values and standards).  It did nothing of the sort.  Pistrina sniffed this out for the scam that it was.  (Click here for their article.)  

And, before that, at the end of the previous school year, Dannie also tried to promote the failing “school” by proudly displaying a picture of eight SGG “graduates” in the 2017 Trinity Sunday bulletin (click here).  But we were there to “sniff that out” too (click here for article).  It turns out that five of those eight were "eighth grade“ graduates,” not high school graduates; and of those remaining three, two were Lotarskis (the “principal’s” children) – that is, there was only ONE non-Lotarski graduate.¹  Note, too, that Dannie fails to mention that SGG’s school enrollment has been steadily shrinking over the years.

Another “failure” for Dannie is SGG’s crumbling infrastructure.  The cult center – even though barely fifteen years old, is falling apart. The problem is that now, Dannie cannot automatically rely on a rich benefactor coming to his rescue.  In “the good old days” (when the cult center was brand spanking new, and the shoddiness of its workmanship not yet apparent), Dannie could always count on Bernie Brueggemann (his main benefactor) to bail him out. But Bernie is now gone, and the cult center’s shoddiness is showing up everywhere.

But an even bigger problem for Dannie is that his credibility is now gone as well.  At one time, everything that Dannie told his Gertie's was "gospel," and he could demand that they not read “forbidden” websites (such as ours and Pistrina’s) -- and they would obey.  But that prohibition carries no weight anymore.  More and more, Gerties are now reading our websites (or are “getting it by word of mouth”) – and they are finding out that what we say is the truth.  Dannie can no longer dupe and bamboozle them as he used to; and they're now getting wary – and suspicious.

(In his November 12, 2017 ’Corner (click here), Dannie mentioned providing a “leak update” [for the roof] the following week (which, by the way, never came). We wonder what will happen the next time SGG experiences a big downpour – in the middle, say, of one of Dannie’s big extravaganzas.  Will Dannie need his ombrellino to keep dry?  Will he have to issue raincoats to all the servers?  Worse still, if there is a clap of thunder, will one of SGG’s raccoons (or some other critter) get “spooked” and fall out of the rafters?  Dannie might have to press Caravaggio into service to get rid of them!  (Perhaps he could camouflage” Caravaggio in some way, to make him “fit in.”  Can you picture Caravaggio in a surplice and cassock?)

So, as the cult center continues to crumble, Dannie seems to be getting more and more nervous.  Have you noticed how “edgy” he’s getting lately (and how much more guilt-tripping and “poor-mouthing” he’s been doing)?²  That’s because he knows that, as the cult center continues its inevitable decline into dilapidation, his costs are climbing, while revenues are correspondingly shrinking – and that it’ll only get worse as time goes on.  In short, Dannie is in trouble – BIG trouble. 

But will this make Dannie change his modus operandi?  Probably not.  Dannie’s an old dog – and “old dogs” and “new tricks” don’t mix.  And, besides, Dannie just doesn’t know any other way.  So, he’ll just “double down” on using his old bag of tricks: lots of syrup and sanctimony, lots of “sympathy ploys” (“playing the victim,” blaming “the Duke” for “high heating bills,” etc., etc.), lots of “enemy bashing” (Bergoglio, the SSPX, anybody Novus Ordo, Feenyites, etc.)  – and, of course, lots of good old-fashioned guilt-tripping – as much as he can get away with. It’s all he’s got left, and he’ll play it to the hilt. 

But he will fail, because he doesn’t have right on his side.  Anything built on falseness and deception -- like a science built on false hypotheses, or a building on a bad foundation, does not stand up to scrutiny.  Eventually, it gets found out.  And that’s Dannie’s problem: all he has going for him is his “S&S” – Syrup and Sanctimony – and nothing else.  Time and again, this parasitic pus-bag has conclusively demonstrated that he is a creature with no moral compass, who only strives “not to get caught” while doing his malicious mischief.  But that’s the curse of those who try to observe “the eleventh commandment,” while ignoring the other ten: they always do get caught!

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¹More often than not, there are NO non-Lotarski high school graduates at SGG’s “school.”  In fact, in the school’s entire thirty-odd year history, there have been more Lotarski grads than all the rest put together.  And the Lotarskis, of course, didn’t have to pay any tuition; their education was free.  So, the “school” was, in effect, their own private tutoring service – at the expense of SGG’s parishioners. 

The “principal” and his wife, of course, are paid handsomely for their services, while the other teachers are either paid subsistence wages – or not paid at all.  One recently deceased teacher (Sharon Patton), for instance, couldn’t even afford to pay for her own funeral.  Instead, it was paid, as Dannie stated in his March 4, 2018 ’Corner, by a “go-fund-me” account: “Thanks to all of you who helped pay for the funeral, and so quickly, with the Go Fund Me site. We appreciate once again the charity and cooperation of Mueller Funeral Home.”

² His whining one Sunday (click here) about there being only one “light bulb” left burning (in SGG’s parking lot) was particularly hokey: “St. Andrew Avellino once miraculously lit the way on a ‘dark and stormy night’ returning from a sick call. There were no street lights back then, but he glowed. So should we. We must ask his assistance for our darkness here, which hit us suddenly last Sunday with the time change. Wegot the one remaining parking lot light functioning this week, but we’re still pretty dark by after the 5:45.” C’mon, Dannie!  Do you really think that people will fall for that line of crap – that you can afford travel to Argentina, but can’t afford a light bulb?