WESTWOOD (NJ)
National Catholic Reporter
Oct. 10, 2019
By Sarah Salvadore
During Mass at St. Andrew Church here, the traffic slows down. A few parishioners can be found standing on the sidewalk with signs in hand while drivers catch a glimpse.
A year after NCR reported on the divisions within St. Andrew over abuse allegations against its pastor, the church is without a full-time priest. Dismayed that the Newark Archdiocese has not sent them a new pastor, some parishioners have taken to protest.
Demonstrators are circulating a petition among churchgoers, urging the archdiocese to send them a pastor. Many parishioners say they are against the picketing, stating it brings negative attention to the church.” “But I’ll sign the petition because we need a pastor. What’s taking Newark so long?” asked one parishioner.
The cloud over St. Andrew emerged in January 2018, when Fr. James Weiner was named pastor. Just 48 hours later, some parishioners learned that he had been accused in a clerical abuse case.
The allegations date back to 1988. Fr. Desmond Rossi, a priest of the Diocese of Albany, New York, accused Weiner and another priest, now deceased, of sexual assault at St. Benedict Parish in Newark. Rossi, a seminarian at the time, said two transitional deacons assaulted him in the rectory after a night of drinking. While one of them threw him on the bed and began kissing him, the other tried to force oral sex on him. Rossi identified Weiner as one of the attackers. An archdiocesan review board found the charges credible but unproven, and Weiner was allowed to continue as a priest.
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