{"id":3014,"date":"2008-08-11T09:02:00","date_gmt":"2008-08-11T09:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2008\/08\/hero-or-heretic.html"},"modified":"2008-08-11T09:02:00","modified_gmt":"2008-08-11T09:02:00","slug":"hero-or-heretic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/08\/hero-or-heretic.html","title":{"rendered":"Hero or heretic?"},"content":{"rendered":"

It just may be the most famous — or infamous — parish in Missouri, known far beyond the borders of its own archdiocese. And this week, the local paper<\/a> takes a look at life at St. Stanislaus Kostka — and puts a sharp focus on the man hired to lead it: <\/p>\n

<\/a>It was just before midnight on Christmas Eve 2005, and the Rev. Marek Bozek was the focus of 2,000 souls crammed in pews or standing on tiptoe in the aisles, straining to see him.<\/p>\n

They came to St. Stanislaus Kostka church to be a part of Bozek’s first Mass as pastor. He had arrived in St. Louis from Springfield, Mo., thumbing his nose at the Roman Catholic hierarchy and riding to the rescue of fellow Polish countrymen deprived of the Eucharist for more than a year by their archbishop.<\/p>\n

For many St. Stanislaus parishioners whose ancestors had built the church just north of downtown, Bozek became a hero.<\/p>\n

But more than two years later, Bozek has reshaped the church into a community that would be unrecognizable to those 19th-century founders.<\/p>\n

His vision for a reformed Roman Catholic faith calls for supporting female ordination, allowing priests to get married and accepting gay relationships. Bozek’s stands have attracted hundreds of new St. Stanislaus parishioners who share the priest’s reform-minded vision.<\/p>\n

But they have also divided the church, pitting newer members against traditional parishioners unhappy with how far the priest has gone in condemning the Roman Catholic church.<\/p>\n

There have also been questions about the priest’s trappings. He has negotiated a 143 percent salary hike, moved into a $157,000 Washington Avenue loft and leased a 2008 BMW for $450 per month.<\/p>\n

Some parishioners point to another sign that alarmed them: Bozek, while in Poland last year, bought a silver ring custom-made for a bishop there. When he returned, he showed the ring to his parish at a Sunday Mass and spoke about it from the pulpit.<\/p>\n

Because it’s a bishop’s ring and he is only a priest, Bozek says, he has not worn it. But he won’t say he never will \u2014 he does not rule out the possibility of becoming the leader of what he calls an “underground Roman Catholic” movement.<\/p>\n

The three parish leaders who recruited Bozek say they now regret it. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To find out why, read the rest<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It just may be the most famous — or infamous — parish in Missouri, known far beyond the borders of its own archdiocese. And this week, the local paper takes a look at life at St. Stanislaus Kostka — and puts a sharp focus on the man hired to lead it: It was just before…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":204,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-churches"],"yoast_head":"\nHero or heretic? - The Deacon's Bench<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/08\/hero-or-heretic.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hero or heretic? - The Deacon's Bench\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It just may be the most famous — or infamous — parish in Missouri, known far beyond the borders of its own archdiocese. 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Prior to that, Deacon Greg worked for 26 years as a writer and producer for CBS News, where he contributed to \"The CBS Evening News with Katie Couric,\" \"60 Minutes II,\" \"48 Hours,\" (Emmy Award, Writers Guild of America Award) and \"Sunday Morning.\" He was co-writer for the acclaimed documentary \"9\/11,\" hosted by Robert DeNiro. (Emmy Award, Christopher Award, Peabody Award, Writers Guild of America Award.) His radio essays were featured in the bestselling book \"Deadlines and Datelines\" by Dan Rather. He's also a two-time winner of the Catholic Press Association Award. Other places you may find him: AMERICA, U.S. CATHOLIC, CATHOLIC DIGEST, REALITY (Redemptorist Communications) and THE BROOKLYN TABLET. He also contributes homiletic reflections to the parish resource CONNECT!, published by Liturgical Publications. In November 2009, he began serving a three-year term as a consultant to the Communications Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). Deacon Greg grew up in Maryland (Go Terps!) but he and his wife today live in the beautiful borough of Queens, New York. You can contact Deacon Greg at dcngreg@gmail.com.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/author\/gkandra"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/204"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3014\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}