Bishops look at fleecings of flocks

So when their priest was charged in January with stealing $600,000 from the church, the couple was devastated.

"I would feel better about all this if he wasn't a priest and was just some con man who conned us," Kathleen Pfeiffer said. "He was loved by us. He knew everybody would do anything for him."

The past year saw several cases where clerics were accused of stealing from their faithful. Some churchgoers say the thefts result from putting too much trust in one person and say more oversight is needed to stop it.

Many religious denominations, especially the Roman Catholic Church, say thefts are rare and they are wary of imposing corporate-style regulations on clerics who need the freedom to address the needs of their flock as they and their teachings see fit.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops will be taking up the issue of whether to adopt more stringent finance guidelines at a meeting this month.

"I don't think we're in any state of epidemic," says Bishop Donald Trautman of the Diocese of Erie, Pa. "But these cases have certainly raised a heightened awareness. We're treating an illness that's been there since original sin."

Among the recent cases:

.Two priests from the Palm Beach, Fla., diocese - John Skehan and Francis Guinan - were charged in September with stealing an estimated $8.6 million from the church.

.Darien, Conn., priest Michael Jude Fay used church money on limousines, stays at top hotels, jewelry, Italian clothing and a Florida condominium, according to an audit by the Bridgeport Diocese.

. The Presbyterian Church USA fired its second-ranking finance officer, Judy Golliher, in June after she admitted to embezzling more than $100,000.

.In 1999, the president of the National Baptist Convention USA, Henry Lyons, was convicted of embezzling $4 million from companies seeking to do business with his followers.

Warning to churches

Leon Panetta, the former chief of staff for President Bill Clinton, says he and others have been warning for years that churches leave themselves too open to embezzlement.

Panetta served on the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Committee on Child Sexual Abuse in 2004 and has continued pushing for the church to increase outside oversight of the finances of individual parishes.

"They've tended to operate like a mom and pop grocery store," Panetta said.

"That's understandable early on," he said. "You pass the collection plate around and that was it. But in these days, they've got to be able to move into the 21st century and begin to apply some management practices that can help ensure that they protect the trust of their parishioners."

A survey by Villanova University of the financial officers that each diocese must employ to oversee its operations found that many dioceses have had trouble with theft.

Villanova contacted the financial officers in 78 of the country's 196 Catholic dioceses and found that 85% of the dioceses reported cases of embezzlement within the previous five years. The survey, released in December, said that 11% of the reported cases involved sums of more than $500,000.

Church officials say the study is misleading.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops points out that the 19,000 parishes that are under those 196 dioceses receive $6 billion a year in donations. The amount of money stolen over the years is minuscule compared to the total amount given, it says.

The financial officers in the Villanova survey said the majority of thefts were uncovered by parish priests, not committed by them.

Still, Bishop Dennis Schnurr, treasurer of the conference, said a lack of financial expertise in Catholic parishes is troubling.

Guidelines for handling church finances that were laid out by the Vatican in 1983 call for each diocese to establish a finance council and appoint a financial officer to advise the bishop on financial matters. Individual parishes must have a finance council that serves as an advisory board to the pastor, although council members are not required to have a financial background.

Schnurr wants priests and bishops to be required to appoint council members who are well-versed in finance.

"Church law does not specify how membership is to be determined," said Schnurr of the Diocese of Duluth, Minn.

"A priest in the seminary, he's there to learn theology and to be able to preach the word of God and provide pastoral and spiritual leadership. Without a question, the lay people are better equipped for administration and finances than the average priest."

'You have to trust people'

Some within the church feel that parishes, especially smaller, rural ones, cannot and should not adopt methods more suited to Fortune 500 companies than priests who rely on the teachings of Jesus Christ to determine how best to make use of the charity of parishioners.

In the Virginia case, officials with the Diocese of Richmond believe the Rev. Rodney Rodis was taking checks mailed to the small rectory and depositing them into a personal account.

While the diocese is considering adding more counters to ensure the accuracy of daily collections, diocese spokesman Steve Neill said there may be nothing they can do to further secure mailed donations.

"You have to trust people," Neill said. "You have things in place to cut down on the possibility of embezzlement, but beyond that you have to trust in the goodwill of people."

Some theologians say that not eliminating parish theft could endanger the viability of a church's mission.

"It demoralizes the faithful," said Larry Cunningham, a theology professor at University of Notre Dame.

Cunningham recently gave several lectures in the Palm Beach Diocese, where he said the churches were packed with worshipers despite the multi-million dollar fraud that took place there. He wondered how long churchgoers would continue trusting their priests if more cases of theft occurred.

"It would still be relatively easy for you to do that," he said, referring to embezzlements. "It's amazing to me that the churches are still filled."