Riches of the Kingdom
Published: Apr 21, 2002
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``I looked at my wife once and said, `What am I wearing that the bishop didn't buy me?' '' Urbanski recalls today.
Lynch's lavish spending on the bishop's former spokesman and near-constant companion knew few limits, Urbanski says. As they drove from a parish north of Tampa one day, the bishop's wallet opened again.
``I was like, `I really wish I had a CD player in my car,' '' Urbanski says. ``Boom! We were in Circuit City, and he said, `I've wanted to buy you something. Pick it out.' ''
They ate lunch in top restaurants almost daily, dined in Tampa's best steakhouses and stayed in fine hotels on business trips - with the bishop always paying.
``The meals we'd eat, I've never eaten like that,'' Urbanski says. ``Appetizers, desserts, it was `Katy, bar the door.' ''
But the steepest tab from their friendship was a $100,000 severance that Urbanski, 42, collected from the Catholic Diocese of St. Petersburg last year after privately accusing the 60-year-old bishop of sexual harassment.
That money came from parishioners, bequeaths, investments and unrestricted accounts, says diocesan lawyer Joe DiVito.
``No parish was assessed any additional money,'' he says. ``No funds earmarked for the ministry were used.''
Compared with the estimated $1 billion experts say the church's growing pedophilia scandal has cost in settlements nationwide, the St. Petersburg case is small potatoes.
But it illustrates bishops' unlimited discretion in spending church money. Critics say it also shows how an avalanche of sex-related damage claims against Catholic clergy is draining the pockets of unsuspecting flocks.
``All the money comes from the pews,'' says Stephen Brady, head of Roman Catholic Faithful, an Illinois-based national watchdog group.
The Bay area's more than 372,000 Catholics, who ultimately paid to make the bishop's sexual harassment case disappear last year, knew nothing about the accusation or the payment until it was reported last month by The Tampa Tribune.
Lynch declined to say where the money for the gifts came from or whether the diocese has any policy governing such spending. But he confirmed he was ``generous'' to Urbanski in a statement issued through his new spokeswoman, Mary Jo Murphy.
``Bishop Lynch is a very generous man,'' the statement says. ``The gifts ... were ... between two friends on birthdays and special occasions throughout the year, as normally occurs between two friends. Some of these gifts were meant for the entire family. He is very close friends with the entire family and has also given gifts to Bill's wife and his children.
``As a matter of fact, he baptized both of their children. Bishop Lynch is also generous with his gift of time and spiritual counsel with all of his friends.''
Diocese Worth Millions
Generosity aside, bishops control a fortune in buildings and budgets within each of the nation's 194 dioceses.
Public records show Lynch's diocese owns real estate valued at more than $250 million spread over 73 parishes, 27 charitable institutions, 12 early childhood centers, 41 schools and two ``Spirit FM'' radio stations, 100,000-watt WBVM-FM, 90.5, and WLMS-FM, 88.3.
The diocese also funds campus ministries at Eckerd College, the University of Tampa, the University of South Florida and Saint Leo University, a Catholic liberal arts college north of Tampa where Lynch is a trustee emeritus.
The diocese will not discuss how much more it owns in stocks, bonds and other financial assets, nor will it say who controls diocesan spending.
Murphy says its money ``is strictly supervised'' by a finance council of laypeople ``knowledgeable in business and accounting'' and audited yearly by an outside accounting firm.
Auditing spending is not the same as controlling it, however, and Murphy would not discuss who has that authority in the St. Petersburg diocese. She said only: ``The business operations of the Catholic Diocese of St. Petersburg follow the normal policies of most large corporations.''
But Fortune 500 companies routinely disclose in their annual reports income, expenses and what their executives earn. Most dioceses do not.
Experts say diocesan spending is controlled by the bishops - that they collect and spend with little or no financial training or Rome-mandated accounting or auditing. They don't even answer to the pope about money, according to Vatican City Cardinal Edmund Szoka, Pope John Paul II's top financial overseer.
U.S. parishes rake in an estimated $7.5 billion annually, experts say, although donations nationally are falling and major deficits plague some major dioceses, including Boston, New York and Chicago.
No figures are published on parish collections in Lynch's diocese. But a separate drive by Lynch this year seeks $8.5 million from local Catholics for the Bishop's Annual Pastoral Appeal, which raises money for diocesan schools, charities and ministries.
A previous drive in 2000 saw more than 26,500 donors give $4.2 million. Gifts averaged $167 per individual, up from $149 in 1999.
It's unclear whether local Catholics are giving less because of the Lynch- Urbanski case or the mushrooming pedophile scandal.
``It's too early to tell,'' Murphy says. ``We just don't know.''
No Demand For Accountability
Murky as diocesan finances are, bishops are under no pressure to make them clear.
Where pay is concerned, for example, the median salary for diocesan priests is $13,600, plus $16,000 in living expenses, says Sister Ellen Doyle, director of the National Association of Church Personnel Administrators, a consulting group that pushes ``just personnel practices rooted in gospel values.''
But no one tracks what bishops make.
``My impression is that most dioceses have a standard compensation plan that applies to all clergy no matter what,'' Doyle says. ``Everybody gets the same thing.''
Doyle says her association has not studied compensation in the St. Petersburg diocese.
Whatever his pay, Lynch lives in a church-owned waterfront home in the Harbor Isle area of northeast St. Petersburg valued in property records at $385,000. And he generates cash from ceremonial functions; officiating at these could bring Lynch $500 to $1,000, Urbanski says.
``He always told me that, at confirmations, he'd get an envelope with money in it,'' Urbanski says. ``He always said he gave one-third to the church, one-third to himself and one-third to his friends.
``No one would ever question him about spending,'' Urbanski added. ``As far as money was concerned, he lived high.''
Church reformers such as R. Scott Appleby, director of the Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism at Notre Dame University, say the church could restore credibility bruised by the current scandals by becoming financially transparent.
Others, such as Charles Zech, a Villanova University economics professor who studies church finances, say church secrecy over money matters is as old as the millenniums.
``The Catholic Church is a top-down hierarchy,'' says Zech, who teaches courses on Catholic economics. ``Very few bishops have ever felt they owe anything at all'' to parishioners. ``The dioceses pride themselves on being nonaccountable.''
Many Catholics seem to accept that. Zech cites a 1994 study that found 38 percent of Catholics don't know how parish donations are spent.
Zech says that could change as younger Catholics demand to know where their money goes. ``They won't be as passive as their parents and grandparents,'' he says.
Gifts Came With A Price
Urbanski says he took the bishop's gifts over the years because ``he always set it up that it was a good thing, that this was for my family.''
In the beginning, Urbanski says, he was grateful. But eventually he came to feel pressured to spend time with the bishop when he would have preferred being home in south Tampa with his wife and two young children.
Urbanski's allegations against Lynch now are widely known.
A chiseled triathlete who grew up in a prominent Tampa family (his father was The Tampa Tribune's president), Urbanski ran a failing bicycle shop until Lynch hired him at $60,000 as diocese communications director, despite a dearth of experience.
He grew uneasy over what he saw as the bishop's unwelcome behavior: remarks about his physique, demands on his time, insistence on sharing rooms when traveling. Finally, he accused Lynch last September of sexual harassment.
When the story of the $100,000 settlement got out last month, the bishop admitted poor judgment but denied breaking his vow of celibacy. He said he sought counseling but offered no details.
Lynch managed the crisis carefully. He named three loyal subordinates - DiVito, Vicar General Brendan Muldoon and Chancellor Robert Gibbons - to review Urbanski's complaints.
They telephoned reports to Archbishop John Favalora in Miami; although the reason for this is unclear.
``He had no input,'' says Mary Ross Agosta, the archbishop's spokeswoman. ``He wouldn't have any jurisdiction in a personnel issue with the diocese.''
Nothing was put in writing, DiVito says. And nothing was disclosed publicly until Lynch learned the story was about to break in the Tribune. Then, he quickly called a news conference to detail his version of events first.
Believers Stand By Catholicism
Zech cautions against comparing imperious church ways with public institutions where accountability reigns.
``The church has nothing like shareholders,'' he says. ``It's not a democracy. There's no one for the bishop to report to.''
Brady is among liberal Catholics who see this as reason to worry that loyal believers are being fleeced.
``The bishops have unlimited resources, by their fundraising capability within a captive Catholic audience,'' Brady says. ``When you control all the strings and you negotiate the settlement, you can spin it any way you want.''
As the diocese tries to shake the Urbanski-Lynch controversy, some parishioners are pondering more accountability. Many are furious with Urbanski and angry that details of the case are still spilling into the open.
As Zech notes, that's not unusual.
``Folks are much more connected to their own parish than to what the bishop is doing,'' he said.
Is that a mistake? ``It's just reality,'' Zech said.
Irish Catholic columnist Jimmy Breslin, who is writing a book on the wider church sex scandal, may typify believers' attitudes, despite snowballing reports of payoffs, secret settlements and legal claims.
``I don't believe much in the church, which is corrupt,'' Breslin told the New York Post. ``I have a great deal of faith in the religion, which is beautiful.''
(CHART) (C) THE CHURCH AND THE DIOCESE
The Catholic Church is the biggest nongovernmental institution in the United States. A top-down hierarchy with thousands of parishes, it collects $7.5 billion a year through 47,000 priests controlled by 375 U.S. bishops who answer largely to themselves. Here's how the five-county Catholic Diocese of St. Petersburg compares with national Catholic institutions.
Parishes: The United States has more than 20,000 parishes. Locally, there are 73.
Schools: The nation's biggest operator of private schools, the church has more than 2.6 million students in 6,900 elementary and 1,200 high schools. Locally, the diocese has 16,385 students.
Universities: Nationally, 670,000 students attend 230 Catholic colleges, such as Georgetown, Boston College and Holy Cross. Locally, the diocese donates to Saint Leo University, north of Tampa, where the fall enrollment was 9,936.
Health Care: Handling 17 percent of U.S. patients, the national nonprofit Catholic system includes 637 hospitals, 122 home health care agencies and 700 other services such as adult day care and senior housing. Within the diocese are five independently run health care organizations: St. Joseph's Hospital and St. Joseph's John Knox Village in Tampa; and St. Anthony's Hospital, St. Petersburg Free Clinic Medical Center and Bon Secours Maria Manor Nursing Center in St. Petersburg. Although the diocese runs Bethlehem Center Inc. in Largo for seniors, there are six other independently operated homes for the aged.
Charities: Soup kitchens, shelters, child care and refugee resettlement are run by 1,400 agencies in Catholic Charities USA, which took in $2.3 billion in 1999. Besides the local Catholic Charities, the diocese runs soup kitchens, homeless shelters, hot lines, legal service offices and counseling; 14 day care centers; and three homes for substance abusers, abused children and adults, ex-offenders, runaways, delinquents and pregnant women.
