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A cherub in his late 60s, gentle, avuncular and smart, Brenkle is probably the most respected priest in the diocese. In 1992, when the previous bishop left an already troubled ministry, 43 priests of this diocese sent a letter to the Vatican requesting that Brenkle be appointed their new bishop.

But Pope John Paul II, uncomfortable with the turbulence of democracy, looked instead to the nearest ranking hierarch, Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles. Mahony sent Ziemann, one of his auxiliary bishops, to Santa Rosa. Former Los Angeles clergy now occupy the dioceses of Fresno, Stockton, Monterey, San Francisco, Orange County, Boise and Salt Lake City; several of these bishops are also Mahony's former classmates.

Now Brenkle, the man whose appointment might have prevented this mess, has been handed a mop and told to clean it up. The irony isn't lost on him.

"As things began to unfold, I found myself angry," he told the town meeting. "I felt duped, lied to and manipulated. Anger was followed by guilt -- what could I have done to prevent this? There were red flags, I could have pursued it. We would go to a meeting where we would be introduced to new people, very able most of them, brought in to take care of the various ministries. We were told, 'We have the money.'"

Brenkle recalled being contacted by someone from the Campaign for Human Development, the fund-raising arm of the Catholic Church's charities, and told that some $90,000 that had been reported collected hadn't been passed on. "Why did I not pursue that? Well, I had other things to do in my life. My own parish to administer. I trusted the bishop."

Then San Francisco Archbishop William Levada called him about the emerging scandal. "When the archbishop says he needs to see you, you know you're in trouble. He sat in my office, he said it would take a day or two or a week of my time. Even he didn't know the extent of this. What has happened here has sent shock waves through the dioceses of the nation. We could prove to be a model for other dioceses."

There was rueful audience laughter at this.

But Brenkel urged the audience to keep their faith, and work to reform their church. "I've been through some wonderful times with this diocese, and I'm not going to bail out now that we're going through some difficult times. That's life. You go through good times and bad times, and you grow through both of them."

Brenkle was followed by Jim Dillon, a lean, silver-haired retired bank executive and chairman of the newly created diocese financial council. On this night he was charged with making sense of the numbers.

"I knew Bishop Ziemann," Dillon began, like a polished finance officer making a boardroom presentation. "I was impressed with his charisma. I had a tough time accepting what had happened."

"What happened" was a case study in bad management. "The reason we haven't been more forthcoming with information is that we don't know ourselves where some of the money went," Brenkle told me in an interview. Only Ziemann and Keys know this, and there is a feeling that more bad news could come at any time.

But Dillon tried to make sense of the existing bad news anyway. "Generally, there were too many ministries, too many employees, no concern for financial responsibility," Dillon explained. "For eight years, there was no budget. The chancery office was running an annual deficit in excess of two-and-a-half million dollars.

"The money all went to operating expenses. There were no vacation homes, no Cadillacs, no expensive gifts to people. It all went to ministries. Another $3.5 million went to pedophilia victims and counseling -- $2 million was covered by insurance; $5.5 million in all."

"The bishop had a discretionary account, linked to the consolidated account," Dillon continued. This system, the brainchild of Keys, consolidated funds from more than 40 parishes in a single bank account, to which the bishop had access. "The bishop wrote checks on it. Last year alone, he wrote checks in excess of $970,000." The audience gasped at this. "A total of $2 million went through the bishop's discretionary account."

The roll call continued, like the sad courtroom biography of a bankruptcy. The priests' retirement fund, $2.5 million, gone; $790,000 in cemetery funds borrowed and not paid back. Even the dead have been ripped off.

What looms ahead, Dillon concluded, is a capital campaign to raise money to repay the loans from other dioceses, with a goal of $15 million. Dillon's tone and posture changed from cool appraising banker to impassioned Catholic layman. "There is no 'we' and 'they' anymore. The people who created this are no longer in control of the finances of this diocese. The laity's voice will be heard. We will need the efforts of everybody. We are the 'we.' We are the body of Christ."

Next page | Blaming victims, not the priests, for sexual abuse