MILFORD (MA)
Milford Daily News
November 14, 2018
By Frank Mazzaglia
Some 4,000 Roman Catholics from across the United States gathered in Boston vowing to transform a church they claimed betrayed them by failing to protect children from sexual abuse. The date was July 20, 2002. It was the first national convention of The Voice of the Faithful, a lay reform group which originated from a church basement in Wellesley only five months earlier.
In theory, Voice of the Faithful presented three goals: 1. To support victims of abuse; 2. To support “priests of integrity”; and 3. To support structural change in the church. The core of the problem, according to noted cardiologist Dr. James E. Muller was “centralized power, with no voice of the faithful.” The idea was to bring together reform-minded and traditional Catholics and demand that laypeople have a voice on key issues.
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