EDITOR’S NOTE: Recent entries were delayed because the bishop began locking his diary in a drawer. Fortunately, he is both lazy and forgetful.
July 22nd, 2026
Dear Diary,
Had to remove Fr Kevin Flaherty from St. Mildred of Thanet’s today. The word for a while has been that everything at St M’s is weirder than it should be. Get it?
Not because of the liturgy, pretty weird, which was Msgr. Tommy’s constant gripe. Kevin goofed around for years. Puppets, “inclusive” creeds, dancing girls with streamers, and something last Pentecost involving a leaf blower. People complained. Lots. Both Tommy and then Fr. Gilbert kept a folder. I told him every parish has a few rigid types who resist pastoral creativity. And it wasn’t because of the crazy homilies. Kevin probably hasn’t said anything recognizably Catholic since… maybe ever. Maybe that’s because he went to CTU in Chicago. Once preached that the Resurrection was “the disciples’ shared experience of renewed possibility.” Tommy said that was heresy. I said we should accompany Kevin and avoid labels.
But money sure has labels! In one of the FCFH* meetings I was pretty much beaten into ordering all the parish books to be audited. They found that Kevin and his secretary, Ms. Crenshaw, had been accompanying nearly 180K into a condominium at Spring Lake. Also restaurant bills, jewelry, and something called a “wellness cruise”. Turns out they have been carrying on for years. Everybody knew except me and apparently Fr. Gilbert, who went pale and said, “But she always called him Father.”
Kevin blew his stack when I confronted him. Said the money represented “reparative compensation for uncompensated emotional labor.” The VG said it represented embezzlement. Kevin demanded a synodal process. Tommy said the police were already conducting one.
The diocesan statement says that Father has been placed on administrative leave because of “financial irregularities and boundary concerns.”
The finance people say some of the money may be recovered. The condo has a hot tub. I asked whether it could become a diocesan retreat center. Tommy said “no” before I finished the sentence. Maybe he’s right.
We went to Razzo’s afterward. I needed something settling, so I had the lasagna, garlic bread, and tiramisu. Tommy had soup. Finally he said, “We warned you about him for years.” “Okay, but nobody mentioned the money.”
*Finance Council From Hell
Honestly, I think one can now assume that anyone doing unauthorized nookie, that goes against vows, is also stealing unauthorized moolah.
At least if the nookie is occurring in an institutional setting without a lot of audits, and the carriers-on are over 22 or so.
I think it ties into a viewpoint of entitlement. If a person feels suavely entitled to break marriage vows or religious vows, the person probably feels entitled to ride roughshod over every other person’s right and contract there is, including property and financial rights.
ROFL! Thank you for the humor and everything else in this “diary entry”!
Our worthy bishop has demonstrated once again my tongue-in-cheek adage, “we have the best(?) church money can buy”. Another one that comes to mind is “it’s all about the benjamins!” Some might counter that the sayings are too cynical, but, sadly, it does make them any less true in our modern church.
Well, I agree with Fr. Tommy that it could never be a diocesean retreat center. That being said, no one ever said it couldn’t be an episcopal retreat center…
All to real.
That is why we pray for Priests.
Have never laughed so hard at one of these before!
Best entry in the Bishop’s diary yet.
Despite the bishop’s weaknesses for food, comfort, and for finding the easy way out, he doesn’t really approve of heretical theology or leafblowers at Mass. And he seriously didn’t like the idea of “reparative compensation” being extracted from the parish accounts. Even the fleeting thought of turning the “accompaniment” condo into a retreat house vanished at the first objection.
Even when he often seems not to understand the good advice he gets, he does yield to it. Sometimes I think there is hope for him and his diocese.
Despite the bishop’s weaknesses for food, comfort, and for finding the easy way out, he doesn’t really approve of heretical theology or leafblowers at Mass.
True. but like 93.7% of the other bishops in this country, neither is he willing to extend his neck even so much as to MENTION to Fr. Kevin that “I don’t really approve”, he lets it slide, over…and over…and over… until parishioners just stop bothering to complain. Of the 6.3% of other bishops, 5.3% do speak up, but ONLY in the form of a preference: “gee, I feel that doesn’t really improve the flavor of the mass”. The remaining 1% do give a flat out directive not to do the leafblower AGAIN, but of course next time it would be a Segway, or a trapeze performer.
As for the bad theology: apparently, there ISN’T any bad theology that qualifies for the name unless you bad-mouth the pope to the point of actual defiance (and only when it’s defiance of liberal popes, mind). And even that can be overlooked if you bring in a lot of immigrants and government funding for same – isn’t there a saying “alms covers a multitude of heresies”, isn’t it? Alms, gov grants: tomato, tomahto.