Why is this man smiling?

   God has played an overweight Polish joke on South Florida with the appointment of the rotund Thomas Wenski as the new Archbishop of Miami – thus replacing the shorter but equally roly-poly Archbishop John Favalora.
   Never mind the teachings of Jesus in Mathew 25.
   Based on my dealings with Wenski, the man has the social conscience of an executive with Goldman Sachs.
   The porky Archbishop was a good 50 pounds lighter the last time I had any dealings with the new spiritual leader of the 800,000-plus Roman Catholics living in Miami-Dade, Munroe and Broward.
   I met Wenski in 2000 when he was an Auxiliary Bishop for the Archdiocese of Miami and I was a policy wonk for Robert Butterworth, then the Attorney General for Florida. \
   Wenski had driven up from Miami to give Attorney General Butterworth and his Fort Lauderdale-based staff an ecclesiastical lecture on the divine right of the Holy Mother Church to do as it damn well pleases.
   In this case, Wenski's righteous wrath was focused on Butterworth's legal battle to prevent the Catholic Church from closing St. Mary's – the oldest and largest safety net hospital for the poor in the Polish-American priest's native Palm Beach County.
   Flushed with anger, Wenski was there to tell Florida's Attorney General to forget any laws governing the assets of non-profit 501C-3 corporations (like St. Mary's) because the Cannon Laws of God's only true church trumped both the temporal statutes and courts of the State of Florida and its 17 million people.
   Although a Roman Catholic by birth, Butterworth dared to disagree with the Wenski's message as a priestly bureaucrat for Christ.
   First, Butterworth explained, as a non-profit 501C-3 corporation, St. Mary's had been built and supported by local donations from Palm Beach residents of all faiths during the hospital's 60-plus years of service to those in need of life-saving health care.
   Thus, Butterworth continued, the assets of St. Mary's – including its 100-acres of community-donated land – must be protected by the State of Florida and so continue serving the health care needs of people of Palm Beach, as opposed being converted into cash for Jesus.
    And finally, Butterworth dared to mention how the Roman Catholic Church had a moral obligation to support any effort keep support St.
Mary's continued operation – given how the church had run the giant hospital into the ground*.
    Which turned Wenski's face crimson with rage.
    Based on Cannon law as established by Rome and St. Peter's heirs, the Roman Catholic Church had the divine right to bankrupt any damn  hospital it wanted to, Wenski proclaimed in the 9^th floor conference room of the Florida Attorney General's Fort Lauderdale office on SE. 6^th Street.
    So Butterworth and the State of Florida had damn well better butt out.
    And that, gentle readers, is the unholy truth.
    As witnessed by me, Attorney General Butterworth, several other lawyers from his staff and God.
    Anyhow...
    So much for Miami's new spiritual leader and Christ's injunction as detailed in Mathew 25.
    Because, based on my dealings with the man, Wenski proved himself to be an arrogant buck-hustling asshole hiding behind the trappings of his Church.
     Plus I'm boggled by the metaphor in the 50-plus pounds of fat Wenski gained from the good life as a well-fed servant of Jesus up in Orlando.
     Oh yes.
     Now a private hospital thanks to Bob Butterworth's legal battle, St. Mary's continues to serve the poor and needy residents of Palm Beach County – despite Wenski's Canonical avarice.

*St. Mary's Hospital – Path to Ruination
(Hardly the Result of Christian Care)

                              1998                         2000
Beds                     460                           460
Avg. Daily
Inpatients             280                           276
Insured                 233                           245
Uninsured            47                             31

Patient Care:
  Gross Charges  $408.9 million         $403.3 million
   Expenses          $155.7 million         $159.9 million
Bad Debts (1)      $15.3 million           $32.2 million
Charity Care         $22.1 million           $21.8 million
Surplus                 $3.2 million            ($42.7 million)
(1) Caused by business office billing meltdown.

NOTE: Today the CEO of the North Broward Hospital District, Frank Nask was the Chief Financial Officer at St. Mary's during the church-owned hospital's financial collapse – which (like Wenski's return to Miami) further proves God's talent for divine Black Comedy.