“Be watchful!  Be alert!”
Mark 13:33

[Information in this post was updated November 1, 2025]

Four words… straight from the Bible. How prophetic they have proven to be in my experience as a longterm employee, and now retiree, of the Roman Catholic Diocese of San José. I share this blog post today for the benefit of other retirees of the Diocese, several of whom read this blog on a regular basis.

I began working in the Diocese of San José in September 1979. I was blessed to have an amazing administrative team at Saint Christopher School. Two Sisters of the Presentation, Sister Eileen Diggins and Sister Pauline Borghello, shared the role of principal. Both were professional, supportive, encouraging, and kind. The pastor of Saint Christopher Parish, Monsignor Norman Allen, treated his employees with the same level of dignity and compassionate care. I worked at Saint Chris for four years as a junior high teacher in the school and director of youth and young adult ministries for the parish. I enjoyed my responsibilities immensely. At the recommendation of Sister Eileen, I left Saint Chris in June 1983 to pursue my master’s degree in school administration at the University of San Francisco.

In the remaining 32 years prior to my retirement in 2015, I was employed at two other schools and one other parish in the Diocese of San José. In those years, I served under five different principals, eight pastors, and two bishops.

Having attended Catholic schools from elementary through graduate school, I became quite familiar with Gospel values, though it was clear to me at an early age that such values were not always practiced by some of my teachers. So while I was disappointed, I was not totally shocked to experience, through my professional career, an alarming lack of integrity, basic kindness, competence, and professionalism by several administrators and ordained priests. The four years I spent at Saint Christopher School and Parish had not prepared me for what was to come.

Needless to say, by the time I chose to retire from the Diocese of San José, I’d had enough. I had witnessed first-hand more deception, dishonesty, harassment, and financial corruption than I could ever have imagined when I began my career in ministry. I would readily have shared my concerns in the “exit interview” at the time of my retirement. Sadly, however, that meeting was not an interview at all, despite the fact that I was retiring four years prior to my normal retirement age of 65. I mistakenly believed that someone at the Diocese might wonder or care why I would choose to do so.

I was immensely grateful to sever my ties with the Diocese of San José. Since the Diocesan Pension Plan was handled by a third-party administrator, I had no reason to continue my relationship with the Diocese. I had completed the retirement documents which clearly indicated that the option I selected was a “Life Annuity with 120 Payments Certain and 50% Surviving Spouse Benefit.” This document was signed by Reverend Monsignor Francis V. Cilia, Vicar General of the Diocese of San José, on July 25, 2015.

For the past ten years, I have received my pension benefit through direct deposit to my bank account. It has always been the correct amount. I was confident that my financial future, and that of my wife, was set in stone… until three weeks ago, when I received a Certificate of Participation from Securian Financial Group, Inc. in St. Paul, Minnesota. This correspondence from the current third-party pension administrator, was for the purpose of “evidencing your rights to receive payments under the annuity contract, which is guaranteed by Securian Life.” 

The problem with this document is that it indicated that my pension was a Straight Life Annuity, a monthly benefit paid during my lifetime until the last payment on or before my death. There was no mention of the 50% spousal benefit. I called Securian. They confirmed that my benefit was a straight annuity that would end at the time of my death. I mentioned that I had elected a reduced pension with a 50% spousal benefit. I was told that they have no record of this. 

I contacted the Benefits Office of the Diocese of San José. They seemed to know nothing about a 50% spousal benefit. So I drove to the chancery to deliver a copy of my Retirement Certification document dated July 25, 2015. Surely this would be sufficient to rectify the error. It wasn’t. I was told to address my concern with Securian.

The next day, I sent the Securian representative a copy of my Retirement Certification document from the Diocese. It took a little more than two weeks, but I finally received a response on Saturday morning, November 1 confirming my claim. A new Certificate of Participation has been issued with the correct information.

What if I had not taken the time to carefully read through the correspondence from Securian? What if I had passed away prior to receiving this correspondence? It seems that no one at either Securian or the Diocese of San José was aware of this “error” in their records. My guess is that Kathy would have been out of luck and my pension would have ended with my death.

I write about this today for one reason and one reason only — to warn other retirees of the Diocese of San José to verify their pension benefits. How many other retirees of the Diocese might have the mistaken belief that the pension benefit to which they agreed, and to which the Diocese agreed at the time of their retirement, might not be in effect due to some “error” in the administration of the Pension Plan? While my situation has been resolved, I feel a moral obligation to follow-up on this issue for the benefit of other retirees whose pensions may also have been compromised.

English philosopher Thomas Hobbes warned over 400 years ago, “Whoever is detected in a shameful fraud is ever after not believed even if they speak the truth.” For me, the credibility of the Diocese of San José has been compromised by the consistent deception, lack of integrity, and unethical practices by Church leaders throughout the past forty years.

In chapter 13 of his account of the Gospel, Mark warned us, “Be watchful! Be alert!” Prophetic words, for sure.