NEW JERSEY
The Star-Ledger
By Star-Ledger Editorial Board
on October 07, 2013
How can Catholic bishops still bumble their way through cases of priests’ sex abuse? How can Trenton Bishop David M. O’Connell justify his long silence before telling a Monmouth County parish of accusations against a young pastor?
On Thursday, the bishop suspended the Rev. Matthew Riedlinger, former assistant pastor at Jackson’s St. Aloysius Church — only days after The Star-Ledger’s Mark Mueller revealed the 30-year-old’s history of sex-charged chats with young men.
But O’Connell kept the secret from parishioners for two years — even as Riedlinger continued to work with kids.
Certainly, the Riedlinger affair isn’t the worst example of irresponsibility in New Jersey’s Catholic hierarchy. There’s no evidence, for starters, that Riedlinger’s dirty talk ever morphed into sexual activity.
Here’s what O’Connell knew and did:
In fall 2011, two Catholic University students told O’Connell that Riedlinger peppered them with sexual chatter while he was a seminarian there. The bishop sent Riedlinger to outpatient therapy, the diocese said, and gave him “a talking-to.” But he was soon back at St. Aloysius, teaching religion classes, including sex ed, to middle-schoolers.
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