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Monday, July 21, 2003
Cardinal sets up system to account for parish funds
CEBU Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal has announced the creation of a “standard accounting system” to keep parish finances in order.
The system will include listing all income and properties of the parish, to specify what goes to church needs and what goes to the priest.
Any parish transaction will be documented—where the money came from, how much and how it’s going to be spent.
The system is computerized for efficiency. Most parishes still store documents the old way: in huge books.
“What used to be the Spanish way of accounting will be modernized. The other changes will depend on the people who are behind the project,” Vidal told Sun.Star.
Cardinal Vidal officially made the announcement during the Cebu clergy’s monthly recollection last Tuesday. A story on it was carried in yesterday’s issue of “Bag-ong Lungsoranon,” the Cebu Archdiocese’s official publication.
He said an accounting of this kind will make priests “sincere in serving God and the people.”
The announcement came amid the call of the laity for more transparency in the dealings of the parish, particularly finances. The call for transparency is among the resolutions submitted in last month’s
Congress of the Laity.
Next: allowance
The accounting system is also hoped to smoothen turnovers of properties and finances when priests are reassigned, because both priest and parishioners know what belongs to whom and how much.
It is common practice in the parishes for priests to keep personal belongings other than those specified as parish property. Ownership of these items, however, often becomes an issue when the priest leaves for another assignment.
Working on the details of the accounting system is the office of economic affairs of the Archdiocese under Fr. Joseph Tan. Another group of priests is also working on the clergy’s standardization of living allowance (SLA).
How the SLA works will be known only after the standard accounting system is in place.
Vidal said the accounting system should be taught in the seminaries of the archdiocese to prepare future priests when it’s their time to implement it.
Money has been observed to be a delicate issue in the parishes.
A recent case of alleged immorality involving a priest had his dismissed workers accusing him of spending parish money on his mistresses.
A parish survives on donations and income from masses and other sacraments. Parishes too poor to be support themselves receive a subsidy from the archdiocese. LPN/LCR
(July 21, 2003 issue)
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