Leaving Home, Part IV

Note: If you missed the earlier chapters be sure to follow the links to read part 1, part 2, and part 3

Proposals (by Matt)

Wednesday, February 11th, 2009. John Chaney, Don Dean and I sat nervously on plastic chairs in one of the large classrooms of what had been, before the merger, the St. Andrew’s sunday school and church office building. Msgr Meaghar, Fr. Chris (his curate) and a gentleman from the parish council of the now merged “Sts John and Andrew Catholic Church” had, five minutes ago, been seated across the table. They had excused themselves and retreated to an adjoining room to discuss the topic of our meeting in private.

The school building where John, Don and I presented our purchase proposals to representatives from the Diocese of Syracuse

We had been worshiping by Msgr Meaghar’s leave in the sanctuary of the former St. Andrew’s Catholic Church for three weeks and had, for about a month, been weighing our options for purchasing the property. As far as assets go, we could offer $150,000.00.

$90,000.00 had been raised by parishioners independently of Good Shepherd. You may recall that immediately after the Diocese took legal action against us the congregation en mass refused give any more money to Good Shepherd for fear of having it confiscated by very people suing us in the event of an adverse decision. The remainder of the $150,000.00 came from an incredibly successful capital campaign launched in the aftermath of our loss in January that had already yielded $70,000.00 with many parishioners sacrificing savings and retirement funds.

But we were still looking at a long shot. The property of St. Andrews including the sanctuary, rectory, school complex and storage garage had been appraised at $700,000.00 just one year earlier in 2008. Even with our $150,000.00 down payment we would still face the seemingly insurmountable challenge of securing a loan or finding someone to hold a $550,000.00 mortgage. The monthly payments for even a very long term loan with a really good interest rate would break us.

But we had no choice. We suspected, anxiously, that there were other interested parties which meant we needed to get an offer on the table as soon as possible and hope that someone didn’t beat us to the punch.  So we did the only thing we could do. We came into the meeting with the only proposals that we felt we could offer in good faith: 1) negotiate an agreement with the Diocese of Syracuse to divide the property into two plots, leaving the school and storage garage and purchasing only the rectory and sanctuary. 2) Seek a rental agreement, leasing the property from the diocese for one or two years while working to raise money for a larger down payment and finance the rest.

We were afraid. Setting ourselves in their shoes, our proposals simply didn’t sound good. The Catholic Diocese of Syracuse stood to profit considerably through the sale of St. Andrew’s. The property had been on the market for less than six months. Why shouldn’t they laugh us out of the room and look for a better offer? The naive belief that ecclesiastical organizations might consider that their fiduciary responsibility includes the wider context of Christian charity had been beaten out of us long before by the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Central New York.

All of these anxious considerations were swirling about in our heads that morning as we sat across the table from our Catholic friends, laying out our proposals as positively and confidently as we could.

I could tell it wasn’t going well. I’m pretty good at reading people’s faces. It wasn’t that they gave any tell-tale signs of disapproval, it was just that they didn’t seem interested at all. They exchanged occasional glances, commented very little, and, most revealingly, didn’t read or listen very carefully. Everything about their body language said: “Our minds were made before we got here and nothing you’ve shown us has changed that.”

After we finished, they excused themselves and went to another room to talk.

I didn’t share my body-language insights with Don and John during that time because it seemed that they had gotten the same message and it felt as if we were waiting for them to return with a polite, gracious, “no”.

We waited for about five minutes when the door to the classroom opened and the three of them filed back in and sat down. Fr. Chris (a realtor in his former life) led off. “We just can’t accept your proposals. We don’t think it would be wise to divide the property and to have you guys renting for a year or two would mean that we’d have to put off some needed renovations and repairs at Sts John and Andrew’s. So I think we’re going to have to say no.”

Fr. Chris Celantano, parochial vicar at Sts. John and Andrew’s and a former real estate agent, helped broker the agreement.

We managed to keep our faces straight but it was devastating. How would I tell Anne that we’d have to move again? How could I tell the congregation?

Fr. Chris wasn’t finished. “We do have something in mind that we think might work. What if we were to knock $200,000.00 off of the sale price?”

“What do you mean?” John asked, not that the meaning was unclear—it just wasn’t processing. 

“Well, if we knock the price down to $500,000.00 that would give you $200,000.00 in equity based on the $700,000.00 appraisal that you don’t have now. You could take that to a bank along your $150,000.00 and only need financing for $350,000.00.

And just like that we went from a desperate and impossible situation—a situation in which securing a bank loan would have been out of the question—to one in which getting a loan at a decent mortgage rate was essentially assured.

Why would they do that? Sure they needed to pay for renovations at the newly merged Sts John and Andrew’s, but from our perspective the only reasonable explanation for their offer is that they are servants of Jesus Christ. How strange and wonderful after the long graceless famine that marked our dealings fellow Episcopalians to see Him in Catholic eyes and to hear Him in Catholic words.

Needless to say, we agreed instantly and the next day John and I met with their realtor and drew up a purchase agreement.
When signed, the agreement gave us exactly 3 months to secure financing.

The Cat (by Anne)

As I described in our last installment, we were able to hold onto the rectory key for a number of weeks, allowing us to go over and check the house every day several times for the cat. I also began calling the local animal shelters every few days to see if someone had found him and turned him in.

Bander the cat

In the midst of the on going cat trouble, I returned to the effort of homeschooling. A wonderful friend brought lunch over one day and helped me unpack what I needed for school and try to make a workable and inviting space in the dining room. With supplies in hand I tried to reestablish a study routine and keep up with the basics.

Looking back through my journal, I apparently also began cooking lavish and complicated meals and school lunches during this time. All our lunch boxes were inaccessible and I only had a beautiful old fashoined lunch basket to pack food in for the one day we went away for classes. The small satisfaction of this lovely and elaborate lunch basket every week carried me a great distance.

Another afternoon I lost track of time thinly slicing sweet potatoes and lightly boiling them, then frying them, then baking them. It took hours but they were delicious.

There was a restful peace about these weeks produced solely by the fact that almost everything we owned was in boxes in the garage and basement. We didn’t know if we would stay in the house and so we didn’t unpack anything but the most basic necessities. The children had only those toys they felt they couldn’t live without, which weren’t many at all. We unpacked some books and a few clothes and the bare minimum in the kitchen. The result was a life lived with virtually no clutter. It was easy to pick up, easy to play, easy to live and allowed the space and emotional energy to focus on our bigger problems.

Over the outward peace, however, hovered the black cloud of the missing cat. Keeping up with school, cooking, keeping up with people from church, under it all was a drumbeat of anxiety and sorrow concerning this cat. The day came when we finally had to turn in the key for the empty lonely old house and so the night before I packed up a thermos of tea, a thick sleeping bag, a pile of books and a flashlight and settled myself just inside the back door with a strategic bowl of kitty food and a the kitty carrier near at hand. I read all night, praying and praying, drinking tea to keep awake. In the morning I did a final walk through the house and outside, calling and calling, left the bowl of food outside and turned the key over, bitter and sick at heart.

I was reduced now to driving and walking through the neighborhood, checking with the shelters and prayer. I was convinced that he had been locked outside of the house and hoped that he would turn up at someone’s back door looking for food—the right person’s back door. Most every day was on going stream of conscious prayer for his safety, for the outside temperature to rise, for a miracle.

Sometimes prayer increases our capacity to believe and trust in God. As we pray we gain a tangeable and knowable sense that God is in control and that everything is going to be alright. Other times, like this one, the Christian prays into a black hole of unknowing. Of course God can do anything he wants. Of course it was within his hand to care for and restore lost and unhappy cat. The question is whether or not he wants to. That is where the darkness told hold of me. I knew with my mind the goodness of God, but I did not believe it with my heart. I despaired. I blamed God for not caring. I grew angry and gave up hope.

On Saturday afternoon, February 21st, about three weeks after we turned in the key, the phone rang. The caller ID said “Martinichio…” The only Martinichio we know is Fr. John Martinichio the rector of Christ Church…the church very much behind the effort to sue us and take our property. Matt hesitated but answered.

In the three weeks since we turned the key in, Christ Church had been in charge of getting our former rectory ready to sell which meant that he was in and out of the house quite a bit.

As he listened to Fr. Martinichio talk, I saw Matt suddenly sit up. I only heard half of the conversation which went something like this:

“Yes we did” Matt said.

“Wow, really?”

“Are you there right now?”

We’re leaving now…we’ll be there in about 10 minutes.”

Matt hung up and said “John thinks he’s found our cat. He wants us to go to the old house to see if it’s him.”

Fr. John Martinichio, rector of Christ Church Binghamton (Episcopal)

Within two minutes—which is lightening speed for us—we tumbled ourselves into the car, two of the little ones without shoes, and broke the speed limit on Conklin in our madness to get there. It was, as always, bitterly cold, and late in the afternoon, about 3:30 or 4 I think. Fr. Martinichio and his wife and daughter were there and led us down to the basement where they thought they had heard the noise. There was a small opening in some built in book shelves allowing entrance into the crawl space under the stairs. When I say small, I mean like the size of a grapefruit, big enough for a thin cat to squeeze through no problem, but not big enough to really reach through and grab anything. Matt and I took turns climbing up onto the book shelf and shining a light through the hole. We both saw his eyes shining in the darkness. He sat staring at us but refused to respond when called, or to move forward at all. We tried reaching through the hole but eventually, at the suggestion of Fr. Martinichio, we began to tear away the boards of the built in book shelf. We tore a big enough hole that I was able to climb up and cling to the wall and stick my arm in far enough to grab Bander by the scruff of the neck and haul him out. We shoved him immediately into the car carrier, thanked the Martinichios and went home in wonder and amazement.

He was fairly weak and extremely spooked, but alive. His first activity, upon arriving at the new house, was to try to climb up into the ceiling of the basement and hide. He so was successful that it was about a week before we saw him again. He came up stairs and let me pet him for a minute or so. Every day, from then on, he would stay a few minutes longer. Now, a year later, he sleeps on my face.

The complete amazement of finding a cat lost for that long, still alive and in one piece, was, for me, the greatest miracle of the whole time.

Court Scene(by Matt)

Friday morning, March 20th, about a month and a week after signing the purchase agreement with the Roman Catholic Diocese of Syracuse, we returned to Judge Ferris Lebous’ courtroom in downtown Binghamton. I say “we” because a good number of parishioners attended court proceedings throughout the legal ordeal.

Broom County Courthouse, the site of what we believed to be our final hearing

At stake on March 20th was the one part of the lawsuit left undecided in January, the disposition of the $600,000.00 bequest. 

Things had been going very well in the three months since we’d lost our old building. We’d been getting between 105 and 115 people in church on Sunday mornings, numbers we would have killed for in our old place. Gifts, financial and material, had been pouring in. Financially, we’d gone from an income of about $8000.00 a month in the old church to twice that. We’d hired a secretary in addition to Micah our youth minister who doubled as musician (which meant we finally had something of a “staff”) and we’d bought a new copier. The weeks prior to our day in court we’d been happily preparing for our first Easter away from our historic church home and enjoying the afterglow of our first episcopal visit. Bishop Murdoch had visited the previous Sunday and confirmed 7 new Anglicans.

This was supposed to be our last court date. We were pretty sure, given the adverse judgment in January, that we would lose the day but we had decided we would take whatever came our way. The interest from the bequest had, in the past, helped to keep old Good Shepherd afloat. Now, thanks be to God, we were surviving quite well without it. With our doubled income and the reduced purchase price offered by the Catholics, we figured we could afford a mortgage. And, it seemed, we were very close to securing a loan.

We did think it important to fight this thing out to the end. We tried to remember that an upset is always possible and the Diocese of Central New York’s “victory” had already been a costly one for them. Along with legal bills, they’d already been stuck with insurance, heating, and maintenance costs on an unoccupied aging building which looked worse and worse every day. The court may have lent the diocese’s property grab the seal of legality but they were paying a high price for it both in the court of public opinion and in real costs. So long as there was even the slightest chance of an upset we were willing to fight it out to the end.

So that morning about 30 parishioners crowded once more into Judge Ferris Lebous’ courtroom.

The argument from the first did not go well.

Within moments it became clear that the judge had already decided, against our attorney’s arguments, to rule on the bequest himself rather than refer the question to surrogate’s court. That was a bad sign but things got worse.

The question of our final accounting was brought up. In his initial decision against us on January 8th, 2009, which granted Good Shepherd’s former building and assets to the diocese, Judge Lebous ordered us to provide a full accounting of all of our assets and all real and personal property. We had done this to the best of our ability but as I explained in a previous installment, due to the haste with which we moved out, there were items taken from the church which should not have been. People were confused in particular about items that had been purchased through their donations in memory of their departed relatives. Most believed that these items counted as their own private property and not the property of Good Shepherd. We’d done our best to clarify this confusion and were in the process of collecting these items and returning them to the diocese, but it was taking a long time to account for everything.

In any case, the opposing attorney complained to the judge that the Diocese of Central New York, had been “inconvenienced” by the difficulties associated with the takeover of our building, the confiscation of our assets, and the seizure of our items of worship.

His complaint resulted in a loud guffaw from some of our parishioners. It was understandable but, in light of where we were, inexcusable all the same. The judge threatened to clear the courtroom.

The opposing attorney continued. In addition to the items still unaccounted for, he charged that the officers of the church, myself and the vestry, had “diverted” and/or “funneled”—he used those words—money away from Good Shepherd to an independent 501c3 called “the St. Matthias fund” established for that purpose. In short, he alleged that we engaged in a kind of theft; that we took money that properly belonged to the old corporation, which in lieu of the January judgment to the diocese, and stole it in order to use it after the trial.

He based his charge on the following issues:

1. Whereas Good Shepherd had $150,000.00 in the bank when the lawsuit started, our final accounting included only around $52,000.00 in assets

2. Parishioners at Good Shepherd pledged to give over $90,000.00 to Good Shepherd in 2008 but there was no record of actual income from these pledges.

3. There was an ongoing campaign led by Good Shepherd parishioners during 2008 to collect money for the St. Matthias fund.

The portrait the opposing attorney’s words painted was indeed an ugly one and his frustration was real and palpable. I can understand why. Our survival to this point had been a source of great frustration and irritation to many people who attended the six dwindling Episcopal Churches in the area and, no doubt, to the bishop and standing committee of the diocese.

Everyone expected us to fold quickly without money and without a building.

The overwhelming Christian charity of the Roman Catholic Church had surprised and frustrated those who had for a long time worked for our speedy demise.

Bishop Murdoch and the first group of confirmands at the new Good Shepherd

Even more exasperating were the public realities that 1. I was still being paid, 2. we had expanded our staff, 3. our numbers were increasing and 4. there had been no great exodus from Good Shepherd to the remaining six dwindling Episcopal congregations in the Binghamton area.

The fourth reality especially rankled some former Good Shepherd parishioners who had departed in 2004 when the vestry voted to join the Anglican Communion Network. Apparently they had gnawed for years on the bare bone that one day I would be sent away and they, joined by their former fellow parishioners who had been blinded by my leadership, could return to the building, call a liberal rector, and all would be set to rights. Surely they thought, with the seizure of the building and assets, their former friends would come to their senses.

Alas it did not happen.

Many Episcopalians were convinced that the four realities above should, by all rights, be impossibilities, unless we somehow stole, funneled or diverted assets belonging to the old Good Shepherd and I believe that these suspicions and frustrations lay at the heart of the opposing attorney’s accusations because substantially—and he must have known this—they lacked all merit. 

The reason for the dramatic decrease in our income from 2008 to 2009 is not too difficult to figure out. We were being sued for our assets. When it became clear early in 2008 that the Diocese of Central New York was quitting negotiations and preparing to sue us, our income from pledges and offerings bottomed out. People refused to give and there was no way to persuade them to do otherwise. So we simply had no income to work with. The vestry had no other choice but to draw on the $150,000.00 in existing assets in order to keep the up the mission and ministry of the church.

At the same time a number of parishioners had independently launched a campaign to raise money by direct contribution to the St. Matthias fund which had been established many years before in Syracuse by people unaffiliated with Good Shepherd for the purpose of providing a way for parishioners in embattled churches across the country to contribute money for the support of whatever entity emerges in the aftermath of a legal battle. By January of 2009, this independent campaign had managed to raise more than $90,000.00 through personal checks written by individuals directly to St. Matthias. I’m persuaded that most of our parishioners participated in this campaign during 2008 rather than giving pledges to Good Shepherd.

But according to the legal experts at the Diocese of Central New York, “people freely and independently deciding to give their own money directly to another organization” is equivalent to “people funneling money away from the church of the Good Shepherd”. And in that case, it appears that the Episcopal Diocese of Central New York faces a crime of unimaginable proportions as every Sunday thousands of Central New Yorkers “freely and independently decide to give their own money to another organization”.

Of course the distinction between people freely giving their own money elsewhere and the officers of the church funneling money elsewhere was not clarified by the opposing attorney who knew better and, unfortunately, given the earlier courtroom protestations by our parishioners and the fact that there were still items missing that we could not account for, the judge was, understandably, in the mood to assume the worst.

Judge Lebous cut the hearing short. He said that he was very disturbed by the accusations and said that the unanswered questions needed to be answered.

A month later on April 23rd, he rendered his decision and it was not good. Not only did we lose the $600,000.00 bequest but as expected he granted credibility to the allegations and he ordered an investigatory probe of our books from 2007 to 2008 to be conducted by the Diocese of Central New York.

It was a disaster.

And it couldn’t have come at a worse time. The bank was in the process of considering our loan application and the Diocese of Syracuse was waiting for the application to be accepted in order to close on the property purchase.

I feverishly imagined the worst possible headlines “Church leaders under investigation for diverting funds”. The accusations themselves despite their lack of substance, when made public, could only give the bank a very good reason to reject our application. They might also, even worse, prompt the Roman Catholics to reconsider their dealings with us.

The future of Good Shepherd hung by a very thin thread.

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