“Hey, I’m the boss of this outfit. I’m not accountable to anyone.”

No right-thinking pastor or mayor or bishop or even CEO would be so foolish as to utter those exact words, but believe me, some of us are living them out.

During this morning’s drive across New Orleans, headed to the office, I listened with interest to the NPR report of a bill being presented to the Connecticut state legislature that would result in a committee of parishioners overseeing the finances of the Catholic Church in that state. The bishop, as you might expect, is alarmed and Bill of Rights proponents (we all fall into that group, I trust) are concerned.

What brought this about, we’re told, is something the previous bishop (or maybe he was only a local church priest) did: embezzled a million dollars to finance a lavish lifestyle including a Florida condominium which he shared with — ready for this? — his boyfriend.

The matter was made worse by that priest’s refusal to allow anyone to look at the parish books. Consequently, parishioners felt they have no recourse to make certain this does not happen again other than going to the legislature.

As a pastor to pastors, I am forever counseling (and urging and preaching!) openness to our church-shepherds. While I’m not in favor of monthly church business meetings where members go over every little decision and every tiny expenditure with a microscope — this is a form of tyranny that should not occur or be condoned by God’s people — nevertheless, there needs to be a proper accountability for every leader. In most cases, a good finance committee will fill the bill.

“The Gambit” is a weekly, free New Orleans magazine devoted to the goings-on in this town, everything from where to find the best crawfish etouffee to what entertainers are playing in the city to the shenanigans at City Hall. In an editorial titled “A Culture of Arrogance,” the paper chides New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin for going back on his election promises of transparency and integrity. His administration has been characterized by everything except that!

The Nagin administration has been woefully slow to respond to requests for public records (state law mandates such records to be turned over within 3 days of the request), and when the records are finally delivered, most of the key information has been blacked out, making it unusable. When a local television station asked for certain e-mails, they were informed that those had been deleted due to a lack of backup space (state law orders them to be kept 3 years). And yet, one of Nagin’s key lieutenants turned over a ton of emails from city council members, delivering them to a friend who had requested them — and did so promptly, without anything blacked out, and illegally, not following the official procedure. The council hollered to high heaven, as did the local media. What’s going on with this bunch?

A judge has found the mayor’s office in contempt for failure to turn over in timely fashion the records he had ordered and for blacking out far too much detail when they were delivered. He gave the administration more time and warned them that failure to comply will result in a fine of $100 a day plus other costs. That frightens no one since all fines would be paid by the citizens, not by the offenders themselves.

The Gambit editors wrote, “There’s an old saying that a fish rots from the head. At City Hall these days, there’s plenty that smells rotten around the mayor’s office. We hope (the various federal, district, and state attorneys) will move swiftly to investigate every suspicious contract and every failure to follow the state’s public records law — and prosecute to the fullest anyone who has violated federal or state laws.”

The article ends, “Only then might the culture of arrogance and the stench of corruption leave City Hall.”

One of our denomination’s agencies conducts annual surveys of associations to find how many pastors and staffers have been forcibly removed from leadership in the past year. Almost invariably, our association will have several names to add to that sad list. This year, I regret to announce that two of our pastors were removed for moral reasons.

My hunch is that in this denomination — and I expect it’s fairly typical of most Protestant families in this regard — the top reasons for dismissal of ministers would include leadership failures (too aggressive or too passive), moral failures (in 90 percent of the cases, this means adultery), and financial irregularities.

None of these should occur, of course, but all the safeguards and accountability-structures in the world cannot guarantee against moral failure. The fences to protect against this have to be erected inside the person’s mind and heart.

The best protection that I know of against leadership failures is for the church to check into a prospective pastor’s (or staff member’s) history before making the relationship official. The best predictor of future behavior is one’s record. Most of the churches that have dismissed pastors for transgressions of this nature had not done their homework before bringing the minister on board.

The good news, however, and we do have some, is that a church can indeed erect financial policies and structures that will protect the congregation — and the minister — from sins (and crimes) involving the church’s money.

Here are some brief suggestions.

1) Have a clear understanding with the minister before he moves to your church on how finances are handled. While you do not want to tie his hands and make his work more difficult, it’s in his best interests for a great system to be in place to guarantee financial integrity.

2) Bring in a financial professional to inspect your church’s procedures and make recommendations. Five years ago, when I moved into this office, we asked a local accounting firm to study how we do things and make suggestions. Upon their recommendation, we made some changes. The person who writes the checks does not open the bank statements, for one thing. We revised the monthly financial reports to make them more readable, and set up periodic meetings in which the administrative committee can see every check that has been written.

3) I suggest that pastors tell their bookkeepers, “If you ever have a question about any check I ask you to write, do not write it. Get back to me. If you are still not satisfied, call the chairman of the finance committee.” I did that in my last church, and repeated it from time to time. In nearly 14 years at that church, never once did Susan Ash have occasion to question any check I asked her to write. (I recognize that if the wrong person is writing the checks, he or she could use that power to harass the minister. The problem in that case is not financial, but spiritual.)

4) No minister should ever handle church money. Sooner or later, someone will hand their tithe to you at the end of a service, with, “Pastor, I missed the offering plate!” When that happens, look around for a church secretary or other leader to deal with it. If no one is available, suggest they mail it in to the office or bring it to the next service.

5) Make sure you have an accountability group in the church, pastor. Give them more information than they require and answer their every question, whether they venture to ask it or just think it.

6) Rotate the members of the finance committee. If the check-writer is a volunteer, rotate that office too. You’re not only interested in protecting the preachers from allegations of financial misuse, but anyone who deals with church offerings.

A friend suggests there may be something cultural at play here. Our African-American and Hispanic churches are less likely to have regular church business meetings where they give all the financial information to the congregation. In this case, the problem is not arrogance in the minister, but a lack of experience. The pastors a minister grew up under did not do this, so he doesn’t.

Our response is that, no matter what his role models did or did not do, a minister should do everything he can to guard the flock and protect his own ministry. Even if it limits his ability to come and go as he pleases, even if it ties his hands somewhat and makes it seem the members are more intrusive into his life, it’s worth the trouble to give a solid witness for Christ to the world and to prolong his usefulness in the Kingdom.

In short, Jesus Christ is not honored when the shepherd of His flock is found to be fleecing them.

The problem is not a new one. In the first epistle that bears his name, Simon Peter told the preachers, “Shepherd the flock of God which is among you, serving as overseers, not by compulsion but willingly, not for dishonest gain but eagerly, nor as being lords over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock.” (I Peter 5:2-3)

Any pastor unwilling to do this should find another line of work.