CLEVELAND (OH)
The Plain Dealer
By Patrick Cooley, Northeast Ohio Media Group
on October 13, 2013
CLEVELAND, Ohio — A Cleveland pastor suspected of soliciting sex from an off-duty park ranger at Edgewater Park Friday was absent from Mass on Sunday. He hasn’t given a sermon since his Friday arrest.
Charges against James McGonegal, the pastor of St. Ignatius of Antioch on Lorain Avenue in Cleveland, were only hinted at in the church’s 11 a.m. Mass on Sunday.
An incident report from Cleveland Metroparks said McGonegal offered a park ranger, who was wearing civilian clothes, $50 to help him “get off,” and then exposed himself while sitting in his late-model Jeep SUV.
After being arrested, he was taken to Cleveland City Jail, where he told jail workers he is HIV-positive, reports said.
The incident seemed to have little effect on church attendance this weekend. On Sunday, the pews of the old stone church were nearly full.
“Today we pray for this parish, and our pastor,” a church lector said before Sunday’s sermon. McGonegal’s circumstances were never mentioned directly.
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