Colts Neck Pastor, Youth Ministers Step down Amid Controversy

By Anthony Panissidi
Asbury Park Press
May 6, 2013

http://www.app.com/article/20130505/NJNEWS/305050060?odyssey=mod|mostcom

Rev. Thomas Triggs announced his resignation from the pulpit during a service Saturday night at St. Mary's Parish in Colts Neck.

COLTS NECK — The resignation of a St. Mary’s parish priest has evoked sympathetic outcries from parishioners, while others believe he had to know he was allowing another priest previously accused of child molestation to work with youth groups at the church.

Father Thomas J. Triggs stepped down Saturday as pastor of St. Mary’s parish in Colts Neck, effective immediately. Bishop David M. O'Connell accepted the resignation according to a news release from the Diocese of Trenton which oversees the parish.

Lay youth group ministers Michael and Amy Lenehan have also stepped down.

The shakeup comes just days after the resignation of the Rev. Michael Fugee, a priest in the Archdiocese of Newark. St. Mary’s parishioners say Fugee had been involved with the parish youth group in defiance of an agreement with Bergen County prosecutors that he not work with children. The Lenehans had invited Fugee to take part in youth ministry events without ensuring he would have been cleared for such ministry in compliance with the Diocese of Trenton's policies.

Fugee’s 2003 conviction on a charge of criminal sexual contact involving a boy was overturned by an appeals court. The priest eventually entered a pretrial intervention program.

Fugee was allowed to return to the ministry, but as part of an agreement with prosecutors, he was barred from having unsupervised contact with minors or a job that requires him to oversee or minister to children under the age of 18.

“The Catholic Church has not been good about reporting people that they are suspicious of,” said a woman Sunday outside the church who did not want to be identified, but has been a parishioner at St. Mary’s for more than three decades. “Therefore I don’t know that (the parish) knew (Fugee) had been through this legal case.”

Triggs had been pastor at St. Mary’s since March, 2007. A graduate of Notre Dame, he has been a priest in the Diocese of Trenton for 35 years. He held various positions associated with youth ministry, and was pastor at St. Charles Borromeo in Cinnaminson before coming to Colts Neck.

“I don’t think the blame should have gone on our pastor,” said another women, a longtime parishioner who also didn’t want to be identified. “He’s the scapegoat.”

But Robert M. Hoatson of Road to Recovery Inc., a nonprofit organization that offers different types of assistance to victims of sexual assault by clergy, said he believes Triggs had to know about Fugee’s past. He also thinks Triggs’ resignation is a result of the public revelation of Fugee’s history.

“One would think, at least, (Triggs) was paying attention to the youth ministry at his parish,” said Hoatson, who noted that Triggs spent 18 years in youth ministry under the Diocese of Trenton.

Hoatson said members of Road to Recovery stood outside the Colts Neck parish Sunday afternoon to offer help to anyone who might have been victimized. The organization did so after canceling a scheduled protest in Newark aimed at ousting Archbishop of Newark John Myers. That protest will be rescheduled, Hoatson said.

Hoatson also said he was once victimized by a clergy member and testified about his experience before the New York Legislature in May 2003 when he was a priest in the Diocese of Trenton. Hoatson said Myers fired him three days later. Today, Hoatson’s group claims several grievances against Myers, including allowing pedophile priests to remain in ministry around children and teenagers.

Fugee spent many hours at the Colts Neck parish and participated in at least three youth retreats, two in New Jersey and one in Canada, said Margaret Franklin, a parishioner whose children were on those retreats with Fugee.

Officials in the Diocese of Trenton insist they were not informed about Fugee — a requirement under church rules for a priest accused of abuse — and did not grant him permission to minister in the diocese.

Archdiocese spokesman James Goodness has said the Archdiocese of Newark did not know Fugee was ministering in other dioceses until they were contacted by a reporter a few weeks ago. Fugee did not seek permission for his work, Goodness said.

Myers accepted Fugee’s resignation letter Thursday night. Fugee remains an archdiocesan priest, but cannot wear clerical clothing or publicly present himself as a priest. Goodness said the diocese does not know if it will petition to remove Fugee from the priesthood.

Prosecutors said they have reopened Fugee’s case to see if the memorandum was violated.

In his resignation letter, Fugee said the Archdiocese of Newark was unaware of his youth ministry work.

“My failure to request the required permissions to engage in those ministry activities is my fault, my fault alone,” Fugee wrote. “I am sorry that my actions have caused pain to my Church and to her people.”

Thomas Plante, a psychologist who has served on the bishops’ National Review Board and counsels sex offender priests, said only a reasonable accusation is needed for removal and most priests, and bishops are “hyper-vigilant” about the issues.

“It doesn’t matter if the person is convicted of a crime or not,” Plante said last week. “All you need is a reasonable accusation.”

O’Connell has granted Triggs a period of sabbatical before he will be given a new assignment. A parish administrator will be appointed for St. Mary’s parish, according to the news release from the diocese.

“Mistakes were made, but we have to move forward from here,” Rorie Coppola, a parishioner since 1976, said on Friday.