Priest's Boss Should Resign

Asbury Park Press
May 3, 2013

http://www.app.com/article/20130503/NJOPINION01/305030022/Priest-s-boss-should-resign

It’s time for Newark Archbishop John J. Myers to step down. He has turned a blind eye to legally binding agreements that forbid the Rev. Michael Fugee, who was convicted of groping a teenage boy, from working with children.

Myers has shown an appalling lack of judgment and willful misreading of a binding agreement Fugee entered into with the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office six years ago. The agreement said he would not work in any position involving children, would have no affiliation with youth groups or attend youth retreats, and would not hear the confessions of minors.

Fugee agreed to the deal to avoid being retried on charges that he fondled the genitals of a 14-year-old boy during wrestling matches on two occasions.

And yet, despite the clear order, he has been working with children, attending weekend youth retreats in Marlboro and at Lake Hopatcong, according to The Star-Ledger. Fugee also has traveled with members of the youth group of St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church in Colts Neck on an annual pilgrimage to Canada. At all three locations, he reportedly heard confessions from minors behind closed doors.

The archbishop has aided and abetted these gross violations of the agreement. In a pattern sickeningly familiar to those who have followed the Catholic sex abuse scandals of the last decade, Fugee was moved around from parish to parish until congregation members became aware of his past. Earlier this year, Fugee was named co-director of the Office of Continuing Education and Ongoing Formation of Priests by the Archdiocese of Newark. The archdiocese defended Fugee, saying the position did not involve contact with children. But there is no way the archbishop should have permitted the contacts with minors.

That point seems to have eluded Myers. The archbishop’s spokesperson, Jim Goodness, in a breathtaking display of twisted reasoning, denied the agreement had been breached, saying the archdiocese has interpreted the document to mean Fugee could work with minors as long as he was under the supervision of priests or lay ministers who had knowledge of his past and of the conditions in the agreement. How about the parents of children in the parish church?

Fugee is currently under investigation by the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office and could face civil penalties, criminal charges, or both, if he is found to have violated the agreement with prosecutors.

What is less clear is if Myers or the archdiocese will face any consequences for this ugly breach in the law and church policy. What is crystal clear is that Myers has become an enabler of a priest who groped a child, rather than a shepherd to his flock, and should step down as archbishop.