Government in the Church

Fr. Michael Sweeney has written two articles on this so far, and they are must-reads:
Part 1: Introduction & Collaboration Between Laity and Hierarchy and
Part 2: The Church is Neither an Absolute Monarchy nor a Democracy. There are probably rumblings about Church structure and governance in most parishes, especially in western/affluent countries. Some would even link this to the sex abuse crisis, giving too much credit to the structure and too little to sin, I think. But this topic is important for even more fundamental reasons, as I think Fr. Sweeney will make clear in those articles.