The Catholic archbishop of Newark, John Myers, on finding out that a
confessed pedophile priest in his diocese was still palling around with
kids, first denied the charge, then defended the fraternization.And we wonder why children continue to be raped by Catholic leaders.
Because Catholic archbishops don’t care about the rape of children nearly as much as they care about bashing loving gay adults in immigration reform, or bashing women.
Rev. Michael Fugee confessed to fondling the genitals of a 13 (or 14, depending on the account) year old boy.
He was convicted of criminal sexual contact, but an appeals court through out the verdict based on the jury incorrectly hearing a part of the priest’s confession – but the overall confession remains in tact. He did it.
Fugee was then permitted to enter into a plea agreement that consisted of counseling, and never working with children again.
The archdiocese of Newark signed the pledge as well, meaning they were responsible for ensuring that Fugee didn’t work with kids again.
Oh but he did.
But that didn’t stop the archbishop from defending the confessed pedophile’s fraternization with even more kids:
Jim Goodness, a spokesman for Myers, denied Fugee had broken the agreement because he was under the supervision of other priests and St. Mary’s two youth ministers, who are longtime friends with the priest.
Monday, Goodness said Myers and Fugee would have no comment.
“Father Fugee remains a priest who is allowed to be in ministry,” the spokesman said. “There is no change in his status at this point.”It seems the archbishop has now re-thought his defense of pedophile priests hanging around with kids, and is now admitting that this violated the earlier agreement.
(Maybe the Vatican should also rethink the indefinite suspension of a Catholic priest in Uganda for blowing the whistle on child molestation in that country.)
Any normal human being, when presented with the notion of a confessed pedophile doing “youth work” problematic at best. But at the upper reaches of the Catholic church, this kind of thing is considered perfectly normal and acceptable until they speak with their lawyer or their PR guy.
When the Catholic church makes up its mind about whether old men raping young kids is a good thing or a bad thing, that’s the day that any of us should care what the Catholic church has to say about immigration reform, women, gay rights or any other “moral topic” of the day.
In no other aspect of society would anyone care what a serial pedophile-enabler had to say about “morality.”
We’d laugh in their face, and quickly usher them out of the room with a swift kick to the ass.
Yet we non-Catholics (and a lot of Catholics too) are forced on a nearly daily basis to listen to the morally-corrupt leaders of the Catholic church, who this day are still defending child-rape, try to tell our political leaders how to run our lives.
Enough already.
PS Someone might want to ask Bergen County Prosecutor John Molinelli if he still thinks giving confessed pedophiles plea deals, with no enforcement mechanism whatsoever – instead of prison time – is a good idea.
I’d also be curious if Molinelli is in favor of not trying all pedophiles, or just the ones with white collars?
I also wonder who else Molinelli cuts pleas on behalf of – all criminals, or just the ones who molest kids? It’s pretty despicable of the local paper to defend this prosecutor cutting deals with people who touch the genitals of children.
I doubt they’d have let Fugee off so easily if he weren’t a priest, which is ironic since it seems it’s always the Catholic priests who continue to get away with more and more crimes after the fact – wouldn’t they be the LAST people you’d cut a deal with?
When do we stop giving special rights to Catholic pedophiles?
Even better, maybe someone should ask New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, since Molinelli is, after all, Christie’s guy.