The associate pastor of a Northwest Side Catholic church fled the country earlier this week before he could be questioned about alleged contact with a minor, according to Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago officials.
“We were about to remove him from ministry and he beat us to it,” said Jim Dwyer, spokesman for the archdiocese.
The 43-year-old priest, who was ordained in Hyderabad, India, apparently returned to that country earlier this week, Dwyer said. He had been an associate pastor at St. Tarcissus, 6020 W. Ardmore Ave., since 1996.
Last week, church officials were told that the priest may have had “an inappropriate relationship” with a teenage girl, Dwyer said. He did not know whether the teen was a member of the parish.
The archdiocese reported the allegation to the Department of Children and Family Services on Monday. Dwyer said that a DCFS investigator told church officials not to confront the priest with the allegations.
However, the priest left a note at the parish saying he was leaving the country.
The bishop in Hyderabad has been notified of the allegations, Dwyer said. Archdiocese officials asked the bishop to tell the priest to return to Chicago and cooperate with the investigation.
Parishioners at St. Tarcissus will be told about the allegations at this weekend’s masses, he said. Phone numbers for DCFS, the state’s attorney and the archdiocese will be provided, “if anyone has any other information” to provide on the allegations, Dwyer said.
Meanwhile, in a Mother’s Day letter to be read at Sunday masses throughout the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago, Cardinal Francis George attempts to reassure the faithful that he and other church officials are aggressively working to address the American church’s sex abuse crisis.
“The protection and care of children have been the bottom line in addressing the current scandal surrounding the sexual abuse of minors by some priests and bishops,” George writes in the open letter.
The letter also says more victims have been coming forward in recent weeks with allegations of sexual abuse by archdiocesan priests. George writes that most of the incidents occurred 15 years ago or more and many of the priests had been taken out of ministry years ago or are dead.
