Ab Abuse ERISA/Libera Nos, Domine

V: Ab omni malo...
R: Libera nos, Domine.
V: Ab omni peccato...
R: Libera nos, Domine.
V: Ab ira tua...
R: Libera nos, Domine.
V: A subitanea et improvisa morte...
R: Libera nos, Domine.
V: Ab insidiis diaboli...
R: Libera nos, Domine.
V: Ab furore Normannorum...
R: Libera nos, Domine.
V: Ab abuse ERISA...
R: Libera nos, Domine.

From the abuse of ERISA--The Employees' Retirement Income Security Act--by the churchmen of Newark, O Lord, deliver us!

Wow. An incredible story:

Pensions in Peril Over Church Exemptions - New York Times: The Hospital Center at Orange became affiliated with the Newark archdiocese in 1998, but it did not apply for the church designation until 2002, when both the hospital and the plan were in deep trouble. Records show the affiliation was part of a plan to coordinate the Hospital Center's operations with those of a nearby Catholic hospital, St. Mary's Life Center. St. Mary's, a specialized hospital offering outpatient services and long-term care, was part of the Cathedral Healthcare System, a family of hospitals run by the Archdiocese of Newark.

The Hospital Center, meanwhile, was a conventional community hospital providing acute care. It had a big caseload of Medicaid and uninsured patients and was constantly strapped for money, said Linda A. White, its former vice president for finance. Officials at Cathedral wanted to turn St. Mary's into a "premier cancer center," according to the affiliation agreement. They proposed sending St. Mary's long-term care services to the Hospital Center, and bringing the Hospital Center's acute-care services to St. Mary's. Cathedral also pledged $10 million for renovations. But the archdiocese now says that none of those arrangements obliged it to assume the Hospital Center's pension fund.

"In the beginning, the affiliation was looked at as a positive thing," Ms. White said. The Hospital Center was more than 100 years old and plagued with elevators that stuck frequently, broken pipes, inadequate computers and many other problems. When the deal was struck, Ms. White said, the pension plan had 95 cents for every dollar it owed the work force -- a respectable level of funding. Then came the bear market. Many pension plans lost ground, including the one at the Hospital Center. By the end of 2001 it had just 76 cents for every dollar it had promised the work force.

In 2002, market conditions did not improve, and employers everywhere began running into special safeguards in the pension law, requiring them to start pumping in money quickly. The Hospital Center's plan slipped to just 58 cents for every dollar promised, and its actuary wrote to the I.R.S. requesting church plan status, retroactive to 1998. The application said the Hospital Center was "controlled by" and "associated with" the Roman Catholic Church. "An employee of the hospital is deemed to be an employee of the Roman Catholic Church," the application letter concluded. The employees were not told of this assertion. They say they considered themselves employees of a secular community hospital.

The I.R.S. approved the application in early 2003. Soon after, the employees learned what had happened. Horrified, they set about trying to get their pension insurance back. But so far, they are caught in a legal Catch-22, struggling to prove violations of the law when the I.R.S. has determined that the law does not apply. The employees retained a lawyer, who brought suit in federal court in New Jersey, arguing that the provision exempting churches from the pension law is unconstitutional.

The judge, Joel A. Pisano, said he was reluctant to take on a constitutional challenge if the problem could be resolved in a simpler way. He gave the I.R.S. 90 days to review its decision. If the I.R.S. would rescind it, he said, then the pension law would once again apply and the employees could bring their case in the normal legal framework. More than 90 days have passed, and the I.R.S. is continuing with its review. Judge Pisano dismissed the lawsuit, saying it was "not yet ripe for adjudication" because the I.R.S. was still deliberating...

One cannot help but think that Jesus would have something to say about this, like "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink: I had a pension for my old age, and ye did steal it..."