7 March 2021

Gimme Dosh

OnePeterFive claims that Cardinal Wuerl is paid a couple of million dollars (US) annually for his Retirement Ministry.

Having given Much Prayerful Thought to the question, I have decided that my own Retirement Ministry is inadequately recompensed (currently £0,000,000 annually).

I shall be invoicing the Ordinary for an appropriate sum, probably as much as ten times that amount.

I had thought of adding "If you want me to keep shtumm about A and B and C, you'd betta pay up prompt". But, sadly, I can't think of an A, let alone a B or a C. I must be alphabetically challenged.

Dull little man. Me, I mean, not the Eminent Wuerl.

But it is Lovely to think that I am now in Full Communion with such vast sums of ready cash, and with such rich Retirement Ministries.

P.S. Why do so many cardinals keep e-mailing me with the message "Nighty night, Baby, I love you"?

8 comments:

Paul in Melbourne, Australia said...

Splendid, Father. I laughed and laughed.

Terry said...

But it is nothing new, Father Hunwicke, for very senior Catholic priests to be a magnet for inordinately large sums of money. For example, Marciel Macial demanded to be given $10,000 of Legion of Christ funds in cash every time he left town - to pursue his double life (source https://english.elpais.com/elpais/2011/03/15/inenglish/1300170041_850210.html)

And then, of course, there is the case of Bishop Michael J. Bransfield.

So surely I cannot be the only person to have been not at all surprised by the apparent cost of Cardinal Donald Wuerl's “continuing ministry activities”.

Terry Loane

Sue Sims said...

Father, given arithmetic, you should definitely demand at least ten million times your current retirement stipend.

Or, since my mathematical husband informs me that zero times infinity can be any number, just ask for an infinite amount of pounds.

Todd said...

FYI - the excellent new publication The Pillar investigated and broke this story. 1P5 picked it up from them.

James said...

You succeed in outdoing yourself far too frequently. Thank you for a good laugh.

Bill Murphy said...

I commented at length on 1P5 about Cardinal Wuerl's millions and, like other commenter, wondered how he could spend such money at his age (80). I suggested that, if he plus a secretary, plus a personal nurse/aide made twice monthly trips to Rome to provide consultancy services on corruption to Pope Francis, that might make modest inroads into the 2M.Say 72 first class return tickets a year at 5,000 per ticket, plus 140,000 for 140 Hotel nights, plus 100,000 for chauffeur limos and meals and miscellaneous costs...that's only 600,000.Take off 1,000,000 for nursing home/living costs and we still need to spend 400,000. Can anyone help out?

Bill Murphy said...

I doubt that the people of Lansing, Michigan will be greatly surprised at the generosity of Cardinal Wuerl's retirement package. The late Father Jonathan built a splendid mansion courtesy of his parishioners - admittedly he does not seem to have asked their permission for the 5,000,000 bucks. A true sign of Christian egalitarianism, that a modest parish priest could live in the same magnificence as a Cardinal. Mutual Enrichment, you might say.

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2020/08/29/priest-auction-accused-embezzling-lansing-area/113601578/

vetusta ecclesia said...



I wonder what the “retirement package “ of a former bishop on the South coast is and who pays ( irony alert!)