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	Catholic Group Gathers in Support of Parish By Susan Shultz The Darien Times [Darien CT] June 15, 2006 http://www.acorn-online.com/news/publish/article_7398.shtml A group that formed after the Catholic priest sex scandals is attempting to tackle the church scandal here in Darien. The Voice of the Faithful of the diocese of Bridgeport met in Norwalk last Thursday to address financial accountability within the diocese's parishes. The Voice of the Faithful is a worldwide organization of mainstream Catholics that was formed in response to clergy sex abuse issues in the Catholic Church. The financial accountability discussion, which was attended by more than 70 people representing the 67 diocese parishes, was prompted by the recent allegations of financial misconduct by the former pastor, the Rev. Michael Jude Fay, of St. John Parish here. Father Fay allegedly used at least $200,000 of parish money inappropriately, according to findings by private investigator Vito Colucci of Stamford. After the findings of the private investigator were sent to the diocese, the Darien Police Department, and the media, the Rev. Michael Madden, parochial vicar and acting administrator of St. John, admitted that he and parish bookkeeper Bethany D'Erario had engaged the investigator. This led to a discussion between Father Madden and Bishop William E. Lori in Bridgeport the same day, which ended in Father Madden requesting he be relieved of his temporary administrative duties, and the issue of a letter of apology to the parishioners signed by him. Parishioners were concerned that Father Madden would be removed from St. John as a result of the hiring of the private investigator. Last week, a new pastor was assigned, the Rev. Frank McGrath, and a letter was issued to St. John parishioners by Bishop Lori. In the letter, the bishop told parishioners of their new pastor, informed them that Father Madden would remain at St. John, and requested their patience as the diocese had an outside firm conduct a thorough audit of the alleged financial misconduct by Father Fay. He wrote that the diocese would provide the written report as a result of the audit to the parishioners upon the audit's conclusion. As St. John Parish begins life with a new pastor, questions remain as to how this financial misconduct was able to occur without the diocese's knowledge, or worse, with its knowledge and without its action to stop it. During the Voice of the Faithful meeting, members discussed the current issues with financial control at the parish and diocese level and what changes they hope will be made to improve them. A statement was read by Tony Gibbons, co-chairman of the Voice of the Faithful, on behalf of the group, regarding the recent events at St. John to start the discussion. In it, the group alleges that the bishop and the diocese had known about the financial misconduct at St. John for six months without taking any action, and then had blamed the "whistle blower" by reprimanding Father Madden. "When the bishop discovered that Father Madden had participated in hiring the P.I., he promptly removed the whistle blower from his position as temporary administrator of the parish and mandated a period of rest and reflection," Gibbons read. In the statement, the reaction by Bishop Lori was compared with previous reactions to charges of priestly sexual abuse. "Blame the bearer of bad news, keep the matter secret and in-house, and avoid scandal and embarrassment," he read. Within the statement, the group included an excerpt from Canon Law, the law that governs the Roman Catholic Church, that in effect gives total financial authority to the pastor of each parish, who has to answer only to the bishop. The law states that any advisory council, such as a financial or parish council made up of parishioners, is purely for consultant purposes only and the final say is with the pastor or the bishop over the diocese or parish councils. "Both councils have only an advisory role, final authority in the disposition of parish goods rests solely with the pastor (Canon 532) and the bishop has sole authority concerning diocesan property (Canons 381, 391, 393,1276-1277)," is the excerpt contained in the statement. Dan Sullivan, a member of the group and a parishioner at St. Aloysius in New Canaan, provided a detailed explanation of how the diocese financial reporting works. Sullivan is an attorney who has extensive finance experience. "There is no requirement under the diocese accounting manual that financial statements are required to be audited," Sullivan said. While he admitted that a professional regular audit of each individual parish could end up being costly, Sullivan said there should be enough professional talent among the parishes to structure a volunteer audit group. He also said that while the diocese requires that the parish financial statements provide an extensive amount of detail, that detail is not released to the public. "They are not willing to release this to the parishioners, the disclosure stops in Bridgeport," he said. Under current church laws, the pastor decides how he wants the financial statements prepared and released to the parish, and decides how often the parish council will meet. A parishioner from St. John at the meeting described the experience of a friend of his who had prepared the financial statements for Father Fay's predecessor. "When Father Fay started, my friend brought the financial statements to him prepared the way he had been previously preparing them, and Father Fay took them to look at them, and then returned with a lot of it crossed out, he didn't want that much detail," the parishioner said. Following that experience, the friend resigned from the financial position at St. John, the parishioner said. This parishioner also said he had heard that Father Madden had so little involvement in the letter of apology signed by him and released by the diocese that "he didn't know until later he had stepped down from the administrative duties." Ken and Susan Byrne, St. John parishioners who were also at the meeting, said they had not planned to talk during the meeting, but wanted to listen. "We really want to concentrate on the future, and moving forward," Susan Byrne said when asked about the details of the days immediately following the scandal. When a fellow Catholic from Redding told the Byrnes she was having doubts about her faith and bringing her children to Mass with the current events facing St. John, the Byrnes disagreed. "Through this entire experience, this dark day has also been a day of sunshine, I have met more people in our parish than I have in the last six years, there's been an outpouring of support that has been astounding, it has strengthened my faith even more," Ken Byrnes said. Members of the Voice of the Faithful encouraged parishioners of St. John to attend more of its meetings, and offered their support, saying they'd provide "anything you need." At the close of the meeting, John Lee and Dan Sullivan said the Voice of the Faithful would continue to pursue changing the procedures in financial procedures and encouraged attendees to go to their parishes and find out how these procedures work. "Who is on your parish council? Who is on your financial council? Find out what your parish does," said Lee. The next meeting of the Voice of the Faithful will be a picnic in Fairfield on June 19. For more information visit votfbpt.org.
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