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| #OWS #D17 Trial photo by Jefferson Siegel |
Below is a portion of
Occupied Bishop George Packard's sentencing statement at his trial yesterday on charges of trespassing and criminal mischief.
No, my great sadness today has nothing to do with the
law, its fairness or even an economic system favoring the few at the expense of
the many in these days.
It
has to do with how Trinity Church has chosen to hop back and forth
between being the aggrieved and trespassed party on the one hand and the
sympathetic ear and support for those who deserve a message of mercy and
forgiveness on the other. There was nothing to be gained by going
forward with these prosecutions. Rector James Cooper even appreciated
"the healthy debate" about his property. I guess that discussion has
limits for him when his corporate side and cash flow takes over.
Is this entity a corporation worried about fiduciary interest
or a portion of the Body of Christ? Which are they? We have received our answer
today by their insistence for this action. In a time when we hope our moral
institutions will speak with clarity…this one didn’t.
Read it all at the link above to Bishop George's blog.
The New York Times gives the story short shrift with only brief coverage, but
Episcopal News Service covers the story with more thoroughness.
A retired Episcopal bishop and a priest from the Episcopal Diocese of
New York were among seven people convicted June 18 on charges of
trespassing on property owned by Trinity Episcopal Church, Wall Street, during a Dec. 17 Occupy Wall Street demonstration and sentenced to four days of community service.
George Packard, former Episcopal bishop suffragan for armed services
and federal ministries, and the Rev. Earl Kooperkamp, rector of St.
Mary’s Episcopal Church in Harlem, had faced up to 90 days in prison on
the most serious charge, Packard’s lawyer, Gideon Oliver, had previously
told ENS.
An eighth defendant, Mark Adams, was convicted of trespassing and
additional charges of attempted criminal mischief and attempted
possession of burglar’s tools, reportedly
for trying to use bolt-cutters to slice through the fence surrounding
the property. He was sentenced to 45 days in prison on Rikers Island and
taken from court in handcuffs, Oliver said in a telephone interview
after the trial.
....
Packard said he was surprised, disappointed and saddened by the
trial’s outcome. He spoke to ENS via cell phone while attending a
post-trial conference about how to support Adams, who he said had
“become the fall guy” for the Dec. 17 Occupy action. The prosecutor
recommended a 30-day sentence, but Adams received 45 days, he said.
“The eight of us [defendants] feel sort of bonded in brotherhood,” he
said. “We’re feeling like a member of the family has been torn out from
among us.”
Trinity did not have to pursue the charges, but it opted to “protect
fiduciary interests,” Packard told ENS. “It’s pretty sad. I mean, this
is what our church has come to. You don’t have enough pledging units to
sustain many places. So we depend on the cash flow of corporate
investment. It’s a caricature of what the gospel is.”
Statement from Trinity Wall Street after the verdict was handed down:
Like many churches, Trinity has a long and active history in addressing
social and economic inequities. While we are sympathetic to many of the
OWS protestors' stated goals, we do not support the seizure of private
property. Trinity urged the District Attorney's Office to offer
non-criminal dispositions before trial and to request non-jail sentences
for those defendants who chose to proceed to trial. All protestors
received sentences of four days of community service, except for one
defendant who was convicted of additional crimes and had several open
cases unrelated to Duarte Square. We continue to support the basic
principles underlying the Occupy movement, and will continue to welcome
protestors, as we welcome all others in our community, to our facilities
in the Wall Street neighborhood.
As I have said elsewhere, Trinity's choice was stark and not complicated...to be on the
side of the angels or on the side of the greedy bankers and financiers
who run our country. Surely the Occupiers represent a very small David
taking taking on the Goliath of Wall Street, but they did it anyway.
In the beginning of the Occupy movement, I wondered what were the demands of the Occupiers, what
conditions they wanted met, until I visited the group in New Orleans
before they were removed from two public spaces. I talked to the people
there and suddenly it clicked. The Occupy folks will not be boxed in
by a set of conditions or demands. When I asked the people why they
were there, each person had a different reason, but it all came down to
the injustice embedded in our political system, which is controlled by
the big money folks. We are the 99%.
And I'm sure many of the Occupiers would laugh at my calling them the
angels, for they are a messy, sometimes loud, and sometimes unsightly bunch. I
don't know but its the kind of situation in which you either get the
Occupy movement or you don't. The light bulb comes on, or it doesn't.
Trinity's choice should have been easy, and they chose wrong. TWS is a church, part of the Body of Christ. What about hospitality? What about forgiveness?
