In the Diocese of Gaylord, the Catholic Services Appeal (CSA) occurs each Spring. Its stated goal is to raise money for the Diocese of Gaylord bureaucracy. However, it’s not really set up that way. Each parish is assigned a tax that they must pay to the Diocese. If it’s not paid to that amount, the Diocese will simply take any shortfall from the parish bank account; the Diocese is essentially guaranteed a set of dollars that the bishop approves to be taken. This is irrespective of any accountability of the Diocese to the parishes for funds that could be used inappropriately by the Diocese.
This year, parishes are once again assigned a tax that is expected to be paid from each family. The Diocese, however, is scheduled to close 28% of its parishes in 2 months (or as the Diocese states, make “limited-use parishes” – a distinction without a difference, ie, these parishes will be for all intents and purposes, closed). Is the Diocese headquarters in Gaylord downsizing? Is the Diocese downsizing its budget in anticipation of all of these closures? Has the CSA been adjusted to reflect this downsizing?
The CSA is further controversial due the projects and organizations it funds. The Diocese has put together a video outlining some of the local programming sponsored by the CSA. But the CSA also has to channel some of its money to the United States Council of Catholic Bishops, which is marred by various scandals regarding its funding. The USCCB has been involved in a variety of shady political projects and has recently been cut off its funding by the Trump administration due to its anti-Trump, pro-illegal alien stances. Before this cutoff in funding, over 60% of the USCCB budget involved government funding; it had no accountability to the faithful Catholic in the pew who was shelling out money to the USCCB. As just one example, the CSA funds the Collection for the Church in Latin America, an arm of the USCCB.
In addition, the CSA funds the Peter’s Pence. This organization has been labeled “not safe” to donate to by the Lepanto Institute, an organization dedicated to truth in the Church and accountability with regard to Church teaching and administration.
It is unfortunate that any CSA dollars would go to the USCCB or the Peter’s Pence collections. This has caused many faithful to withhold donations to the CSA. Together with concerns that faithful have brought up with regard to what is and is not funded in the Diocese, the donations to CSA from faithful in the pews remains suboptimal. It remains the right and responsibility for Catholics in the Diocese of Gaylord to know where their hard-earned dollars are going and to be reassured that their dollars are spent for authentically Catholic endeavors. Not only that, it is the responsibility of the Diocese to reassure, in an open and synodal way, full and transparent accountability with regard to the CSA dollars. This has yet to be seen.