When you run xfcalendar without a .xfce4 it dies as it tries to mkdir ~/.xfce4/xfcalendar however it could just as easily make the .xfce4 directory and indeed if it is to be useful without xfce4 it should. Also it moans on the console about not being about to open its config file because one doesn't necessarily exist yet it seems to do fine without it and indeed the MCS settings get saved into xfcalendar.xml yet it has some other setting which get saved in the xfcalendarrc. (If you look at the code the first line could say [icky icky ptang fnord] and it would still apply to "Session Visibility"). I think it should a) create .xfce4 if it doesn't exist and b) create the default xfcalendarrc if it doesn't exist whenever it is started. (though it might want to use the MCS stuff for all its settings I guess)
Fixed in HEAD. The .xfce4/xfcalendar/ directory is now created correctly, and the xfcalendarrc file is created if not found.