Voices, Voices Everywhere!

VOTF Nashville, TN
Reported by Patricia Newton

On Tuesday, February 25, 2003, the Nashville, TN VOTF Committee Supporting the Priests hosted a dinner for priests of the diocese at St. Ann Parish Life Center. Six priests attended, joining Nashville VOTF co-facilitators and committee members. Together, this group discussed VOTF goals, planning and recruitment of new members.

To further the recruitment and retention of new members, the Nashville VOTF Chapter will have a general meeting to hear a presentation by two experienced organizers, Rev. Ray Sells (a Methodist minister) and Irene Boyd (a member of the Nashville Catholic community), from Tying Nashville Together (TNT). The location is the St. Ann Parish Life Center. This will be held on Thursday, Feb. 27, 2003 at the St. Ann Parish Life Center.

TNT is a faith-based organization that began about 10 years ago in Nashville and now has over 50 churches, synagogues and mosques as members. TNT has accomplished much for the people of Nashville, including the creation of a mediation center, which takes hundreds of minor cases from the courts each year, an after school program in 12 Metro Nashville Schools and higher wages for workers at the Metro Nashville Nursing Home.

Nashville VOTF is making plans to participate in the 2nd annual St. Patrick's Day celebration in Nashville on March 16.

The Nashville VOTF Chapter issued its first monthly news letter in January 2003. The newsletter can be seen on the St. Ann Parish web site at www.saintannparish.com.

The Nashville Chapter is especially grateful to Father Phillip Breen, Pastor of St. Ann Parish, and the St. Ann Parish community for the wonderful support extended to Nashville VOTF.

VOTF-Greater Fort Meyrs, FL
Reported by Goz Gosselin

After accumulating experience with my VOTF colleagues in the Archdiocese of Hartford, CT., I came to Fort Myers, FL ready to locate other Catholics interested in forming a new affiliate. With a core group of fourteen, including my non-Catholic wife Terri, we organized our first "general meeting," advertised as a VOTF Informational Meeting. Over 85 people attended and 31 are official members of our new affiliate. Our steering committee is planning a second meeting to be held on March 10th. Plans are to show the Fr. Tom Doyle tape from the July VOTF Conference. A listening session will also be part of our program, as we feel this is a most important part of what VOTF is about. Unfortunately, we are still meeting off church property, but hope to change that, after our visit with a chancery official.

Florida has only three official affiliates, with ours being the third. We have one located in N. Naples, and the other in Sun City Center. We are helping folks in the Palm Beach area get started, and there seems to be interest on Marco Island. Florida is basically untapped, and much work is to be done. We have unusual conditions here, as so many of us are "snow-birds." Finding year-round leadership has been troublesome, but all will work out, with the help of the Holy Spirit.

(Ed. Note: Since Goz filed his report, the News-Press in Fort Myers, FL noted the following:
"Bishop John J. Nevins of the Diocese of Venice is not opposed to Voice of the Faithful, a lay Catholic group that soon might have three chapters operating in his diocese. 'Bottom line, Bishop Nevins is not opposed to Voice of the Faithful and their main goals as we understand them to be,' said Gail McGrath, diocese spokeswoman.")

VOTF Northern New Jersey Affiliate
Reported by Maria Cleary

Deal Hudson, oft-quoted VOTF critic and publisher of CRISIS magazine, was the featured speaker at our February meeting. We made the decision to invite Hudson because we felt strongly that we should be open to dialogue with all voices, whether supporters or detractors. To the surprise of many in our audience, Deal identified much common ground in our concerns about the Church and its future.

We have begun weekly "Prayerful Voice" gatherings at a lovely little chapel in Whippany, NJ. It is wonderful to have a chance to be spiritually refreshed by sharing some scripture and song with our VOTF brothers and sisters.

We're reaching out to our priests in a much more active way by sponsoring a series of "Priests' Forums." One of our local churches is providing us with space, and we've invited every member of the clergy from the Paterson diocese to attend any or all of four discussion groups. Our March meeting will also feature a panel of local priests who will discuss how the church crisis has affected their lives and ministry.

Pray for us as we discern whether or not we can handle a Tri-State Regional Conference for NY, NJ and CT sometime this year. We'll keep you posted. Blessings from all of us Jersey folks to our VOTF family across our country and the world.

VOTF St. Agnes Parish Voice, Reading, MA
Reported by Pat Coppola

Our Parish Voice has been actively involved in implementing a process for the laity to have a voice in the selection of their bishop. We are in the early stages of creating task forces for the nomination process and soliciting key candidates to be part of a search committee. Fr. Robert Bullock, head of the Priests' Forum in Boston, will be coming to speak with us on 2/26 to discuss the selection of a new bishop.

In March, we invite other members of the Boston Archdiocese to participate in an archdiocesan-wide meeting of laity and clergy. For further information on this meeting contact Marie Collamore at bishopsearch@yahoo.com.

If anyone is interested in learning more about this process (remember there will be many bishops approaching retirement in the future), we have information we can send to you. Please contact us at the above email.

Our committee to support our priests of our parish has initiated prayer vigils held twice a month, including day and evening hours.

The committee of Survivor Support has asked members to email or write the Office of Healing/Barbara Thorpe at the Archdiocese to demonstrate our outrage of their decision in making public the confidential files of sessions held with survivors in therapy.

VOTF Merrimack Valley, MA
Reported by Stacey Quealey

I would like to compliment and acknowledge the recent success at St. Augustine, Andover, MA Parish Voice.

Emilie Gilbert is the Parish Voice leader for St. Augustine (as well as the Regional Coordinator for Texas). Upon hearing about the Archdiocesan requirements for parishioners to be CAP trained, she single-handedly alerted her pastor, educated him about the necessity of it, and recruited four of her Parish Voice VOTF Steering Committee to attend the training!! Because of Emilie's hard work, one more parish will be successfully trained in the prevention of child abuse.

This is just one wonderful example of how we can work together to Protect the Children and to encourage the active involvement of the Laity in our church.

VOTF Winchester, MA
Reported by Bob Morris

This month our Priests' Support Group announced the results of a major survey of 30 priests from the Archdiocese of Boston. The results were based on in-depth interviews of priests conducted by our members over the past several months. The survey revealed the need for an open and collaborative relationship between priests and laity as well as a swift and due process for priests accused of clergy sexual abuse - punishing the guilty and exonerating the innocent. Priests noted overwhelmingly their diminished quality of life within the tarnished image of the Catholic Church.

The survey is divided into three distinct portions: background information, current parish situation, and working for the future. Excerpts from the survey are as follows:

Complete survey results may be obtained at our Web site. We owe an enormous debt of thanks to Christina Hurley, who led the Priests' Support Group in this effort, and also to Mary Deyst, John Deyst, Elinor Downey, Marie Doyle, Clare Keane, Jean McCarthy, and many others who contributed to this effort.

On February 3, our group approved a letter of invitation to Bishop Richard Lennon, which was mailed shortly thereafter. While no response has been received, it is our fervent hope that the bishop responds favorably to our invitation. It is our view that face-to-face contact with the loyal Catholics who make up Voice of the Faithful will go a long way to dispelling any mistrust that the hierarchy may feel toward VOTF.

On February 10, our group welcomed Fr. Thomas Nestor. Fr. Tom, who is on the faculty of St. John's Seminary in Brighton, and who is also in residence at St. Eulalia's Parish where we meet, addressed the education afforded priests in training. He also fielded questions for over an hour, addressing a wide variety of issues in an open and thoughtful manner. One of his many comments that rang true was calling VOTF the "conscience of the Catholic Church" - a designation which we strive daily to live up to.

St. Bernard's Parish Voice, West Newton, MA
Reported by Martha Rowlands

Mary Jo Tecce requested that a liaison from St. Bernard's join the national Prayerful Voice working group. Joe Drake agreed to serve in that capacity.

Several members volunteered to help with the 3/19 fundraising phonathon at the office in Newton, MA.

We continue to work on a letter to Bishop Lennon, the interim administrator for the Boston Archdiocese. We have relied on several communications including Bishop Gregory's detailed response to our letter in November.

VOTF Orleans, MA
Reported by Patricia Clock

Our still-new VOTF group had a very successful second meeting at St. Joan of Arc Church. We had about 50 people show up on an ugly, foggy, rainy afternoon. Father Roy dropped in for a brief time at the beginning and reaffirmed his hospitality just by his positive presence. We broke up into four brainstorming groups to discuss where we wanted to go as the Orleans group and allowed the "personality" of the gathering to emerge. We generally have a very positive and hopeful group who are looking to establish a supportive presence to priests of integrity as well as find our voice as the priesthood of the baptized.

A strong group has come forth to assume planning and leadership and will meet together prior to the next meeting of the larger group, which is scheduled for March 23 at 2:30 in the parish center. We are also working on a database.

VOTF Saint Ignatius of Loyola Affiliate, Chestnut Hill, MA
Reported by Stephen Sheehan

The Saint Ignatius Affiliate of VOTF was blessed with a combined retreat and planning conference at the Jesuit Retreat House on Cohasset for the weekend of January 31 to February 2. This was a gift to us from out Pastor, Fr. VerEecke.

The weekend began with dinner and a gathering on Friday evening, with time to become acquainted with our guests. On Saturday, the program included a focus on spirituality as well as a look at organizing grassroots efforts. Time was allocated for conference, personal reflection and group discussion.

Margaret Roylance discussed the current working paper of the Structural Change Working Group, again with conference, reflection and discussion. (See the Web site at www.votf.org for details.)

The afternoon ended with a liturgy provided by Rev. Ken Loftus, a member of our steering committee. Supper led us into an evening of relaxed community and sharing with each other our personal feelings and thoughts.

Sunday, after an informal breakfast, we concluded the retreat with prayer and a steering committee meeting to translate what we had discussed into future program planning.

All came away feeling spiritually renewed and with a much better sense of what we expect to accomplish and how to approach the coming year in terms of scheduling, programming and spiritual orientation.