The February 27 reports commissioned by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops force Catholics once again to face the enormity of sexual abuse in our beloved church. They also bring us together to think about what changes are needed so that these horrors do not erupt again.

In response to these reports, Voice of the Faithful of Greater Philadelphia calls for the resignation of "cover-up bishops" and for major structural changes to give the laity a meaningful voice in the church. The current crisis cannot be resolved in depth until we have a church of transparency and accountability (including financial accountability) in which the laity, hierarchy, priests and vowed religious are partners in the decision-making process. We all are members of the Body of Christ and must all take our full responsibility for the church’s welfare.

As national VOTF has insisted from its beginning in 2002, the church needs structural changes through which the laity can actively participate in the governance and guidance of the church. The report from the bishops’ National Review Board is a major confirmation of VOTF’s perspective. The Board is made up entirely of lay men and women. For the first time in the history of the U.S. Catholic church, the bishops (responding to lawsuits, a tidal wave of devastating publicity and a massive drainage of church monies) have been forced to subject their decisions to the scrutiny of lay people.

We welcome and applaud these reports. They show what can happen when lay people participate with clerics in the governance and guidance of the church. The National Review Board itself represents a major structural change at the top of the church. Its report, however, fails to address the need for structural changes at all levels of the church.

The most important structural change involves the laity. Catholic lay men and women are treated by the hierarchy as if they have lesser gifts and talents and are of lesser account than those who are ordained. They cannot be elected to office in the church and are not allowed to participate in the election of others. It is contrary to church teaching that the laity, which accounts for 99 percent of church membership, has no voice in the formulation of policies that affect them and their children.

The church must put in place elected lay bodies, with real power in the decision-making process, at the parish, diocesan and national levels. Fortunately, the church can build on existing structures, such as Parish Pastoral Councils, Parish Finance Councils, and Parish Safe Environment Committees. Finally, the laity again must be allowed, as it was in the past, to participate, along with bishops, priests and vowed religious, in the selection of local pastors and the appointment of diocesan bishops.

A second needed change involves the bishops. Not a few of them moved priest abusers from one locale to another while covering up the abuse, made secret settlements and intimidated abuse victims and other voices who tried to bring the scandal to light. Once the scandal erupted, the National Bishops Conference quite rightly set up a system to hold the priest perpetrators accountable, but ignored those bishops whose actions prolonged and intensified the abuse. We are not pointing fingers at specific bishops. Those who covered up crimes know who they are. We call upon them to search their consciences and to do the right thing for the good of the church.

The third needed change is to institute financial accountability. Eight in ten Catholics rate church financial reform as a major concern. No mechanism currently exists for public accounting—for instance, disclosing what happened to the $5.8 billion that American Catholics put in the collection basket in 2002. Steps must be taken at all levels of the church to create financial transparency. Lifting the veil on church financial secrecy offers bishops a unique opportunity to restore trust in the church.

The restoration of the laity to full partnership in the decision-making process will not solve all of the problems facing the church, but it will go a long way to prevent the kind of tragedy so clearly outlined by the Catholic bishops’ reports.

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