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The US Catholic Bishops Conference that year housed nothing but a rogue's gallery of dead men.
The keynote speaker was about to give the opening address, but received word from a staffer that breaking news said many Chanceries in the country were being raided by feds with search warrants. New York, Houston, Austin, San Antonio, San Diego, Phoenix, Tuscon, Brownsville, Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, Washington DC, and on and on and on.
This was one minute before the speech was supposed to begin.
And this was seven days after the Hollywood raids had commenced in New York, Austin, and California.
Shit, thought the speaker. The feds connected it to us.
He looked at the audience.
All of us, he knew.
This would be the final speech that anybody in that room would get to make before a public audience.
So he gave it the best he had, considering the circumstances.
"My brother bishops, let us begin today's conference with an opening prayer. In the name of the Father, and the Son—"
Right at the invocation of the Son, FBI agents stormed the conference room.
One agent shouted loudly, "FBI! Nobody move! We have arrest warrants!"
This one agent proceeded to the stage, and took the microphone.
"Sit down, please", he said. "OK, everybody, here is what's going to happen. I have a list here of bishops who are under arrest. Nobody try to leave the room. It's fenced off with hundreds of agents. When I call your name, please stand, and we'll arrest you. Bishop Arthur Richardson".
Nobody stood.
"Gentlemen, I know he's here. So I'll say it again. Bishop Arthur Richardson."
Still, nobody had the courage to stand.
"OK, how about one more time? BISHOP ARTHUR RICHARDSON!", yelled the agent.
Bishop Arthur Richardson finally stood. Agents came to arrest him.
"You see? That's all you had to do!", exclaimed the agent.
The agent moved down the shit list.
"Bishop William Leigh", said the agent.
He stood, shaking like a jaybird. Agents came to arrest him.
And the list went on, one by one, many of them going down.
The Conference was being live streamed. The cameras never shut off. Anybody at home could see this play out in live time.
The arrests took approximately ninety minutes. When they were finished, the entire room was empty.
It was all three hundred of them.
For the first time since the late 1950s, many of the Catholic laity faithful finally found unity: many of them slept in Heavenly peace that night.
All of those three hundred bishops would eventually be replaced by three hundred Traditionalist Conservative Catholic priests who wouldn't even steal candy from a baby.
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