Navarre resident Jackie Trebesh said she was flabbergasted and
irritated when a Catholic priest denied her and her daughter Holy
Communion, and then had a Santa Rosa County deputy pull her over.
She said she was so surprised by the actions of The Rev. John Kelly
at St. Sylvester’s Catholic Church in Gulf Breeze she thought at first
she was being “pranked.”
“He’s not God. He can’t do that to people,” she said.
Trebesh said she and her 19-year-old daughter Rachel attended a
Friday morning service and were turned away when they approached the
priest to take Holy Communion.
Trebesh said Kelly told them, as he denied them communion, that he would explain his actions after the mass had ended.
She said she decided not to wait around for the end of the service
and had left the church parking lot when a deputy pulled her over.
Trebesh said the deputy informed her that Kelly had requested the
traffic stop. She and her daughter were issued trespass warnings.
The Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office and the Catholic Church
confirmed much of her story, but said there were justifiable reasons for
their actions.
According to Trebesh, she learned the reason she was denied communion
was because someone at the church had seen the daughter dispose of the
host, as it is called, improperly in the church parking lot.
The Catholic Church believes the wafer provided during Holy Communion
to have been transformed during the mass to the actual body of Christ.
“The matter of disposing of the Eucharist in an inappropriate way is a
serious matter to us,” Peggy Dekeyser, the communications officer for
the diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee said in confirming Trebesh’s
theory.
Trebesh said the only thing she could think of that Kelly or anyone
else might have seen her daughter do was “spit out a piece of gum in the
parking lot.”
Asked if the substance of the item Rachel Trebesh was seen disposing of had been verified, Dekeyser declined comment.
Sgt. Scott Haines with the Santa Rosa Sheriff’s Office verified the
fact Trebesh was pulled over as she left St. Sylvester’s Church. He said
the church had requested Trebesh be given a trespass warning.
“We issued the trespass warning on behalf of the church,” Haines said. “They were banned from being on the property.”
Trebesh said she had left the church parking lot prior to being pulled over.
Dekeyser said the Trebesh family had been contacted since the communion rejection incident.
“We are entering into discussion and dialogue with the Trebesh family
and would welcome the opportunity for the family to return to church,”
she said.
Trebesh said no one from St. Sylvester’s Catholic Church has contacted her.
SIC: TDL/USA