David Milroy is the new Development and Stewardship director for the Archdiocese.  I have met with him on a few occasions, including a meeting here at St. Paul where myself, Tara Doyon, our Development Director, and Jennifer Seitzinger, our Stewardship Coordinator, sought his advice.  One of Mr. Milroy’s tasks is to facilitate the annual archbishop appeal (now named Christ Our Hope).  He instituted a new change: Money collected from a particular region of the diocese will be used for the ministries in that region.  In other words, the Church of Bloomington (St. Paul, St. Charles, St. John) takes care of the good works of the Church here, not in Indianapolis (they take care of their own).  For us this primarily is Catholic Charities.  Only if our resources are insufficient do we go higher for additional funding.  There is a name for this strategy: subsidiarity. 

Catholic Charities is not the sole responsibility of any one parish.  Thus it is part of the common good of the Catholic Church’s work of charity.  In order to meet the goal of sustaining Catholic Charities each parish is assessed an amount of money.  This is nothing else but a tax.  Milroy’s subsidiarity schema changed the financial levy of most parishes, including ours; our assessed amount is $36,000 this year (last year it was $56,000…and we never met this goal).  Without this “tax” Catholic Charities would not exist or meet its goals.  Actually, Catholic Charities is working on a shoe string budget.  There is more that they could do.  Presently they excel in counseling at a minimal fee.  There is a huge need for Spanish-speaking counseling and social services, for counseling and education on domestic abuse, etc.  They can only do what they can afford.  They can only afford what we provide. 

This same strategy is at stake with the public school funding situation.  Either this community values education or we don’t.  We are all voting with out pocket book: taxes.  Without a vision of the common good and a wise application of subsidiarity, taxes only appear to be legal robbery of one’s income.  Indiana is flirting with eschewing taxes that support the common good of institution of schools.  As our parishioner Constance Furey said a recent letter to the H-T (4/6/10),

...if we as a society believe it is important to heal the sick, to educate people and to feed the hungry, then we all need to take responsibility as a society.  That's why we pay taxes.  That's why we have a government.  Charity is admirable, but it is no substitute for justice.

Public school funding is a debatable morass.  But, at least, it is worth our energy to seek a better solution than to acquiesce to lower property taxes “at any price” at the expense of adequate personnel at our schools.  If the quality of our schools drops it will have long-term effects…on our children.  What a cost for pocketing more personal income! 

The common good costs everybody something.  It is a bad strategy to back away from this cost.  Whether it is Christ Our Hope, property taxes or a parish tithe, funding these agencies provides an incredible amount of human services which enrich our lives (Note: fiduciary accountability is also required in this formula of public trust).  Where does the conversation about our schools need to go?  Who needs to be in this conversation?  How soon must we act before we’ve destroyed the integrity of our schools?