News Briefs

San Francisco Archdiocese announces Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing

August 22, 2023 Catholic News Agency 5
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone meets with people experiencing homelessness at St. Anthony’s Dining Hall in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood on Nov. 6, 2021. / Dennis Callahan

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 22, 2023 / 09:40 am (CNA).

San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone on Monday announced that the archdiocese would be submitting a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, a development the prelate had earlier warned might come about as a result of numerous abuse filings against the bishopric.

Cordileone earlier in August had warned that the filing was “very likely” in response to the “more than 500 civil lawsuits” alleging clerical sexual abuse filed against the archdiocese.

A Chapter 11 filing, the archbishop said at the time, would allow the archdiocese to deal with those cases “collectively rather than one at a time,” resulting in both a “faster resolution” of the crisis as well as “fair compensation” for the victims.

In an announcement posted on the archdiocese’s website, Cordileone said that “after much reflection, prayer, and consultation with our financial and legal advisers,” the archdiocese has “filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization.”

“We believe the bankruptcy process is the best way to provide a compassionate and equitable solution for survivors of abuse,” the archbishop said, “while ensuring that we continue the vital ministries to the faithful and to the communities that rely on our services and charity.”

The prelate noted that San Francisco is one of a growing number of dioceses and archdioceses filing for Chapter 11 as a way to address abuse lawsuits. At least 13 dioceses are currently engaged in bankruptcy proceedings, while 18 have emerged from it.

Cordileone said only the “legal entity” of the archdiocese itself would be covered by the bankruptcy filings. “Our parishes, schools, and other entities are not included in the filing,” he said. “Our mission will continue as it always has.”

The archbishop said offertory funds from individual parishes, as well as funds raised during annual appeals, would not be used to cover the costs of the settlements. “[T]hese funds, which you so generously donate, are collected for use by the stated ministries, which exclude legal settlements or related expenses,” he said.

Cordileone noted that the “great majority” of abuse claims occurred “many decades ago,” with most of them involving “priests who are deceased or no longer in ministry.”

The archbishop urged the faithful to “join together on a daily basis in praying the rosary, spending an hour each week in adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, and fasting on Fridays for the survivors of abuse, for the mission of our archdiocese, and for the eradication of this shameful crime from our society as a whole.”

Among the other U.S. dioceses that have filed for bankruptcy this year include Oakland; Ogdensburg, New York; and Albany, New York.

The San Francisco Archdiocese covers about 2,300 miles of area in northern California; it lists about 440,000 Catholics in its boundaries.

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California’s new abbey is inspiring young men to join the priesthood 

August 21, 2023 Catholic News Agency 3
A group of men studying to become priests at St. Michael’s Abbey in California. / EWTN News In Depth

Denver, Colo., Aug 21, 2023 / 14:45 pm (CNA).

Just outside the City of Angels lies an abbey whose residents are praying to the angels. St. Michael’s Abbey outside of Los Angeles in Orange County opened in 2021 and is one of the newest abbeys in the world.

“It’s sort of the perfect distance between the busyness of the city, where we need to be doing our apostolic work, and the quiet of the desert, where we need to find Jesus in contemplation,” Father Ambrose Criste, a priest at the abbey, told EWTN Correspondent Colm Flynn in an interview for “EWTN News In Depth.”

The Very Rev. Chrysostom Baer, prior of St. Michael’s Abbey, shared that it is like “heaven on earth.”

“It’s filled with the Catholic truth and the solemn celebration of the liturgy. It’s a place to work out your salvation, to grow in virtue, to overcome your vices, and help lead people to heaven,” he added.

Despite the recent decline in religious vocations in many parts of the world, St. Michael’s Abbey has 42 men studying for the priesthood and many more waiting to enter. This past summer, the order established a new priory in Springfield, Illinois, where seven of the California Norbertine priests now live.

Criste believes young men are being drawn to the community because the abbey has stayed true to the order’s traditions.

“We say our prayers; we wear our religious habit; we live according to the charism of our order and the traditions of our order, and we’ve never really given any of that up,” he said. “And that’s why young people want to come and be a part of it.”

The abbey follows the canons of the Norbertines, which was founded in 1121 by St. Norbert in France.  

The order’s mother abbey is called the Abbey of Csorna, which is in Hungary. In 1950, the police warned the Norbertines in the country that they would be taken away under the Communist regime and never be allowed back into Hungary. A small group of priests then sought and received permission to leave the country in order to keep the order alive elsewhere. 

Today, St. Michael’s Abbey has 70 men living in it, half of whom are priests and the other half who are seminarians.

“Those religious communities and those seminaries that represent authentic, full-bodied traditional Catholicisim — the young people are flocking to it because it’s exactly what the young people want,” Criste explained. “It’s what the world needs.” 

Baer said he hopes, first and foremost, that the abbey will “save souls and be a beacon of light and hope in a very strange land, a land that thinks that it’s gone beyond God and doesn’t need him anymore.”

“We’re trying to fill that gap in the human heart with the truth of Christ and the love of the Holy Spirit,” he said.

The segment about St. Michael’s Abbey on “EWTN News In Depth” can be viewed below.

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