(The following is a summary of the actions and formal recommendations approved by the Lay Congress of the Archdiocese of Atlanta held May 20-22. It is based on a draft prepared by General Chairman James Callison to give not precise wording but “the basic intent of the recommendations.” This first article deals with the general intent of the Congress and their recommendations on the parish. Next week: The Recommendations on Education. -- Ed.)

Two substantive matters were discussed and recommended by the Congress. The report states that (a) adjustment should be made in clergy salaries and (b) retirement and disability should be established for the clergy by the clergy-lay board.

The Congress recommends that the administration of the archdiocese shall be departmentalized, and all departments will operate through the Chancery office, fiscal matters clearing through the Department of Administration.

Other departments may include Social Services to coordinate and supervise social and welfare services; Development and Planning to coordinate and introduce long and short range programs for expansion of physical facilities; Pastoral Affairs to supervise religious activities and welfare of the clergy and lay employees; Communications to inform the people of the archdiocese (The publication of the GEORGIA BULLETIN and operation of the Bureau of Information will fall under this department.); and Education.

The following guidelines were drawn up by the Congress with the intent that each department would adopt its own constitution and by-laws keeping the following items in mind:

1. The constitution and by-laws should follow as closely as possible the narratives on each department.

2. Each department should meet at regularly scheduled intervals.

3. Lack of a high percentage of attendance (minimum 60%) should be mandatory grounds to request the archbishop to replace the delinquent member.

4. The chairman of each department of the archdiocese, except Pastoral Affairs, should be a layman, and the secretary should be a clergyman. The function of the latter is to guide, teach and counsel the lay chairman in the performance of his duties. This structure will lend to permanence and continuity to the work of these departments.

5. Membership on each archdiocesan board should be on a rotating basis with the members not to serve more than two consecutive terms of not more than 3 years each.

6. Each member of the recommended departmental boards should have one vote, and a majority vote of those in attendance at a meeting which a quorum is present should control, subject only to veto or prescribed revision by the archbishop.

7. No person should serve in two archdiocesan departments at the same time.

8. The lay members of each department should be fully representative of, and speak for, the laity of the archdiocese. To attain this end, this Congress strongly recommends the following procedure: (a.) Each parish shall annually elect a slate of qualified persons, one for each archdiocesan department and submit this list and a dossier to each electee to the Archbishop. (b.) The archbishop appoint members to the archdiocesan departments from the total list of lay electees. (c.) The archbishop may appoint one layman at large to each committee without regard to that layman’s elected status. (d.) The membership of each department should include at least one member who is not a resident of the metropolitan area.

9. Fiscal control and responsibility, in all the departments of the archdiocese (and also on the parish level) is of major importance. Fiscal responsibility is not incompatible with spiritual development.

One of the major concerns of the Lay Congress was the problems facing the parish.

The draft reads as follows:

1. Each parish shall have a basic organization or organizations (herein called “councils”) embracing all members of the parish family, Catholic and non-Catholic spouses alike, lay and religious alike. The council or councils shall meet at regular intervals and shall serve as the voice of the parish family in parish planning, development, administration and activity, as the means by which the laity are organized to discharge their responsibilities to the parish and the archdiocese, and as the major channel or channels for explanation of parish policies, plans, needs and programs. There should be no more than three such basic organizations, for example, parish councils of men, women and youth. The two adult councils could be combined if desired.

2. For purposes of efficient operation, the basic council or councils should encompass all major parish activities in which the laity are to participate, including lay assistance to the fullest extent possible on all parish temporal matters (except those handled by the budgeting and finance committee and the school board hereinafter required) and church-connected or sponsored programs (e.g. girl and boy scouts). All such activities should be conducted whenever possible as departments or committees of one of the councils.

3. The ultimate government of each basic council should be primarily vested in a body such as an executive committee, to consist of officers (to be elected by eligible lay and religious members of each organization) plus the pastor or his priest delegate. These governing bodies shall function as hereinafter provided for all parish bodies which make and/or execute parish policies and decisions.

4.Parishes which have separate basic councils for men and women should have an overall coordinating and governing body consisting, for example, of the pastor and some or all of the officers of each basic council.

5. In addition to the basic councils and their departments and committees, each parish shall have a Budgeting and Finance Committee consisting of the pastor, members of the laity appointed by the pastor, and lay representatives from among the elected officers of each basic council (at least equal in number to the number of members appointed by the pastor). This committee shall require annual advance budgets from each organization in the parish which spends or authorizes the expenditure of parish funds, shall approve or require revision of each such budget, shall budget for the parish as a whole, and shall be responsible for the submission of all required budgets and related reports to the archdiocesan office charged with financial administration of the archdiocese, and for the publication of an annual financial report to parishioners.

6. (Deal with Congress’ recommendations concerning parish boards of education which will be discussed in next week’s article).

7. The executive committee of each basic council, the Budgeting and Finance Committee, the Parish School Board and any department or committee of the foregoing and every other organization which makes and/or executes parish policies and decisions concerning temporal matters shall be constituted so as to have a majority of lay members, and to provide that a lay man or woman shall be chairman or president. All members (clerical, religious and lay) shall have one vote each and a majority vote at a meeting at which a quorum of the committee, board or other organization is present shall control, subject, however, to the pastor’s right to specifically disapprove any decision or part thereof. In the event of a veto, the pastor shall give an explanation of the disapproval and the committee, board other organization shall have the right to reconsider its decision in order to meet the pastor’s requirements. Each such subsequent decision shall also be subject to the pastor’s right of veto.

8. The executive committee of each basic council, the Budgeting and Finance Committee and the School Board shall meet at regularly scheduled intervals (at least quarterly) and at other times at the call of the pastor or the lay chairman or president.

9. Periodically (at least once each year) each pastor shall report in writing to the archbishop concerning: (a) the membership of the executive committee of each basic council, of the Budgeting and Finance Committee and School Board; (b) the number of times that each such body has met since the last report, together with a brief description of the work done by each body; and (c) the number of times that full membership meetings of the basic councils have been called since the last report.

10. All reports to the archdiocesan offices by the executive committee of the basic councils, by the departments or committees thereof (for example, building committees) which make and/or execute basic parish decisions concerning temporal matters, by the Budgeting and Finance Committee and by the School Board, shall be signed by both the pastor and a lay member (normally the lay chairman of each such group);

11. Whenever there is a disagreement concerning temporal matters which, after due effort, cannot be resolved between the pastor and a majority of the lay and religious members of council executive committees, the Budgeting and Finance Committee, the School Board, and departments or committees of the foregoing or of other groups which make and/or execute parish policies and decisions, on which the pastor exercises his veto, the pastor shall within two weeks report his veto in writing to the archbishop with his reasons therefore (with a copy to be sent to all members of the committee concerned). The disagreement may be submitted by either side (or by both sides jointly) to the archbishop for resolution. Such submission shall be in writing and shall proceed through the proper channel on the archdiocesan level which has general supervision over the subject matter in dispute. Whenever one side takes such an appeal without consent of the other, the appealing side shall give the other side advance notice of the decision to appeal.

12.The Budgeting and Finance Committee of each parish shall prepare an annual, advance budget covering all aspects of parish operation which involve the use of parish funds, which shall be submitted in the manner above specified for approval by the archdiocesan office charged with financial administration of the archdiocese.