Throw the KIDS Under the Bus!

There is a special General Assembly scheduled for January 31^st to discuss and vote upon the 2010 budget – the one that did not pass last winter. If the rumors coming out of the Parish Council are true, every member of this community has an obligation to be there.

It seems that the CLERGY and board members have been unable to get the message we are trying to get across to them.

If everything we hear is true, we are going to be presented with two options; one would be the original budget which requires us to allot some $135,000 from the Festival proceeds. The other option will involve budgetary cuts involving Youth Expenditures!

Yes, again, we witness that our clergy, along with its hand-picked parish council, is perfectly WILLING to throw our kids under the bus in order to coerce the community to hand over more monies to them!

We do not need our youth, do we? Let them go play basketball, soccer, practice dancing, or go camping, or even attend Sunday school at their neighboring LDS wards! And we do not need hourly paid employees to maintain our properties! NO. Let’s just give pay raises to the ones who already draw six-figure salaries, even in a depressed economy, while others suffer. One wonders if the Parish Council members run their family affairs and finances in the same manner as they seek to run our community’s finances.

In last 100 years we have been through the Great Depression and several recessions since then, but never before have we experienced the financial difficulties our Church is going through now. Nor have we ever witnessed the indifference of the clergy and our elected leaders to this degree in prior times of hardship.

Certainly this is not 1929, but why are we having these problems? In the last few years we have conducted two surveys; we still don’t know the full results; we just have the commentaries, but no “big picture” interpretation – surely our board must have learned SOMETHING from these surveys – why are they not publicizing them or ACTING upon them. Is it because they didn’t get the answers they hoped to get? Our Parish Council undoubtedly has looked at these surveys and they know what has brought us to this BIG FAT MESS we are in right now. It is unfortunate that our Parish Council members have agreed to be so blinded and so cowed.

For those who will attend this General Assembly, we ask that they remember that almost 50% of our budget expenses are in priests’ salaries, along with our obligation to the Metropolis and Archdiocese. THIS is where cuts should be made, and not in our Youth programs. Once again we see our clergy and hierarchy holding our own kids hostage.

We should all be there, and we should all remember that it takes a Village, a Community, a CHURCH, to make a difference in the lives of our youth, our future!

Expectations

Certainly everyone has received the latest stewardship materials. In the January/February issue of the Messenger a footnote on the Stewardship Review page states: "**Based on the outcome of the Fall 2009 General Assembly, it was determined that the projected operating deficit of $135,000 for the 2010 budget be recovered through Stewardship." We further read that this is an increase of 15% over the budgeted amount for 2009 of $625,000.

If memory serves, the General Assembly asked for cuts in the 2010 budget, which was never passed. How is it now that we are told that stewardship must increase by $135,000? We are expected to give generously yet we are deprived of the opportunity to worship on major feast days. Information that we are entitled to according to the UPRs is withheld; general assemblies are no longer a place where our voice can be heard as we are either out of order or cut off; qualified members of our community are excluded from serving on the parish council for frivolous reasons, yet we are expected to give generously. How can our leaders have such expectations when they continue to enforce pray, pay and obey?

New Year - Old Habits

Happy New Year.

We begin the new year with the same strange behavior to which we have grown accustomed. Even though we have here in Salt Lake City three full-time priests, the two proistamenoi chose to take vacation resulting in Holy Trinity being closed on the feast of St. Basil. Why did both proistamenoi choose to take vacation now instead of earlier in the year? How does a parish council, who supposedly represents the people, allow such a thing to happen? How can we spend more than one-third of our budget on their salaries and not receive their services?

Also of concern is the closure again of Holy Trinity on Epiphany. Our metropolitan has provided Protocol 09-18 with the policy of the metropolis for the celebration of services for this feast which says in part: "to promote uniformity throughout the Metropolis of Denver, please prepare your schedules according to the following guidelines." www.denver.goarch.org/protocols/2009-Protocols/protocol-09-18.pdf. Does closing Holy Trinity promote uniformity as requested?

It might be a new year but some things never change.