THIEVERY: Catholic Church EXPOSED!
There are roughly 37,000 Catholic priests in the United States—the vast number of them have dedicated their lives to God and the church community—and thousands more church members who’ve worked tirelessly behind the scenes to support their religion. This documentary is not about them; nor is it “priest bashing.”
It’s about those priests, employees, and laity who’ve failed to fulfill their obligations and responsibilities, and worse, schemed, connived, and lied to hide their thievery. It concerns the unethical behavior of bishops and other church officials who chose not to confront these individuals; who instead, chose to hide their misdeeds, and unscrupulously schemed, connived, and lied —which in fact, led to more stealing and embezzlement, more negative press, and added to the current financial crisis.
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THIEVERY is based on ninety-seven news stories uncovered through a comprehensive assessment of legal cases, newspaper stories, and articles reported from 2002 to 2018. Due to the plethora of cases found involving illicit financial activities in the Church, a $100,000 threshold was used as a general guideline for inclusion in the study. Examples of these stories are referred to in the text as “notable cases.”
Collectively, the cases had a direct financial impact on the Church of more than $53 million, with millions more missing and still unaccounted for. The cases occurred in over half of the states — Michigan leading the way with seventeen, followed by sixteen in Ohio, thirteen in Pennsylvania, and ten each in New York and Wisconsin.
Starting in 2002, when the sex abuse scandal erupted, four key words — thievery, embezzlement, Catholic priests — were used to conduct exhaustive computer searches until the last entry for each year was evaluated, and then probing again, to follow each lead to its conclusion.
The cases highlighted in the following chapters illustrate various ways in which the purposes of the donators were NOT honored. Sometimes it was an embezzlement by a priest, then again, it was a secretary, or a deacon. Still other cases point to the trickle-down impact of the Church’s “faith-based” organizational philosophy, where it was possible for unethical behavior to be masked by the level of trust given to a person.
