Billboard on Carnegie, Downtown Cleveland

This is to-day's addition to the electronic billboard on Carnegie Avenue, west of East 14th Street.

To-day, in the afternoon, there will be a presbyteral council meeting in the Roman-rite diocese of Cleveland, Ohio. One of the many deficiencies exhibited by Lennon, bishop of Cleveland, and cited by the Vatican decrees was his non consultation of his presbyteral council.

14. The law requires for validity that the Diocesan Bishop consult the Presbyteral Council in order to seek the advice of its members before coming to his decision regarding the suppression of a parish (canon 127 §2 and canon 515 §2). Finally, a legitimate decree should be issued, stating at least in a summary fashion the lawful motivations supporting the decision (canon 51), formalizing the Bishop's dispositions and making them manifest to those who have interests in the matter.

This was not done. In the opinion of at least one canon lawyer (and anyone with the power of logic): "To fulfill the intent of the law the bishop must approach the presbyteral council before he has already made his decision."

For public consumption, and to falsely impress parishioners, a long "pre-clustering" and "clustering" process was enacted for the parishes. This has no canonic role, and was only used to buttress the actions of Richard Lennon. They were cited to show agreement and participation, never were they used to show disagreement. They were a farce.