Foley Fondler Barred from Church Work (now that it's public)

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Foley Fondler Barred from Church Work (now that it's public)

Via NY Transfer News Collective All the News that Doesn't Fit

["Morally reprehensible, canonically criminal, and inexcusable" they sputter.

Sure... now that's public knowledge. The guy is retired and almost 70 years old.

The fact that nothing was done about him before he became the latest poster

boy for Roman Catholic Clergy's pedophilia is what's reprehensible, criminal

and inexcusable. -NY Transfer]

AP via USA Today - Oct 20, 2006

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-10-20-diocese-foley_x.htm

Archdiocese of Miami bars Foley's alleged abuser from church work

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) ? The Archdiocese of Miami on Friday barred a

retired Catholic priest from all church work as it investigates former U.S.

Rep. Mark Foley's claim that the clergyman molested him as a teenager.

The Rev. Anthony Mercieca, 69, now lives in Malta and a diocese there has

also opened an investigation after he said this week he fondled Foley and

was nude in saunas with the Florida Republican when he was a boy in the

1960s.

"Such behavior is morally reprehensible, canonically criminal and

inexcusable," the archdiocese said in a statement.

The archdiocese also said it has no reports of other allegations against

Mercieca. Spokeswoman Mary Ross Agosta said pastors at each of the eight

South Florida churches where Mercieca worked between 1965 and 2002 have been

told to talk to parishioners in an effort to find other victims.

Foley, 52, resigned from Congress last month after the release of his

sexually explicit computer messages to teenage male pages. His lawyers later

said Foley was an alcoholic, gay and had been molested as a boy by a

"clergyman." He entered a 30-day rehabilitation program for alcoholism on

Oct. 1, his lawyers said.

Agosta said Foley should speak to church officials so they can get more

specifics to help the investigation. She said if the allegations are

determined to be true, Mercieca could be forced from the priesthood.

"An apology is due to Mr. Foley for the hurt he has experienced," the

archdiocese's statement read. "While it was long in coming, with God's

merciful grace this painful revelation can be the beginning of

reconciliation and an instrument of redemption and healing for Mr. Foley."

Foley's civil attorney, Gerald Richman, said he did not know if Foley would

cooperate in the church's investigation.

"You can't predict what's going to happen when he gets out of treatment,"

Richman said. "There's no immediate plan. His number one thing is just going

through treatment right now."

In recent interviews, Mercieca, who lives on the Maltese island of Gozo, has

denied having sexual intercourse with Foley, but has given different details

about the encounters.

On Wednesday, he told the Sarasota Herald-Tribune by telephone that he

massaged the boy in the nude, was naked with him on overnight trips and they

had gone skinny dipping together. On Thursday, he told The Associated Press

that he was naked in a sauna with Foley.

Also Thursday, he told WPTV of West Palm Beach that he touched Foley "once,

maybe."

"It's not something you call, I mean, rape or penetration or anything like

that, you know," he told the TV station in a telephone interview. "It was

just fondling."

Mercieca had worked at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Lake Worth in 1967,

according to church records. Foley would have been 13 at the time. Foley's

attorneys have said the abuse occurred when Foley was between the ages of 13

and 15.

Richman turned over Mercieca's name this week to Florida state prosecutors,

who gave it to the archdiocese.

A spokesman for the state attorney's office in West Palm Beach, Mike

Edmondson, said law enforcement action is over, unless other alleged victims

come forward, because Foley's attorneys have said that the politician

doesn't want to prosecute. Also, the statute of limitations has expired in

Foley's case.

The diocese of Gozo opened its own investigation after Mercieca's remarks

were reported in the media.

Charles Buttigieg, a spokesman for the archdiocese of Malta, the main island

of the archipelago south of Sicily, said Friday he was not aware of any

other complaints against Mercieca.

Mercieca, a Maltese citizen, is retired and does not serve in any parish on

the island, the Rev. Anthony Refalo, the Gozo diocese spokesman, told the

AP. However, Mercieca regularly celebrates Mass and hears confession in the

cathedral, one of two main churches on the island.

"Bishop Grech, conscious of the gravity of pedophilia, reiterates that he

will cooperate with those responsible for investigating such cases so that

justice is done to the victims, the perpetrators are reformed and the common

good is safeguarded," the diocese of Gozo said in a statement.

Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

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