From: Media Relations <mediarelations@archchicago.org>
Date: January 12, 2019 at 5:00:37 PM CST
To: Media Relations <mediarelations@archchicago.org>
Subject: Statement of the Archdiocese of Chicago on Father Patrick Lee

Statement of the Archdiocese of Chicago on Father Patrick Lee

January 12, 2019

Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, archbishop of Chicago, has asked Father Patrick Lee, pastor of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish (Chicago), to step aside from ministry following receipt this week by the Archdiocese of Chicago of an allegation of sexual abuse of a minor in 1979 while Fr. Lee was assigned to St. Christopher Parish in Midlothian. The allegation was received by the Archdiocesan Office for Child Abuse Investigations and Review. In keeping with our child protection policies, the allegation was reported to the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) and the Cook County State’s Attorney. The person making the allegation has been offered the services of the archdiocese’s Victim Assistance Ministry.

The archdiocese has begun its review of this matter. Fr. Lee will live away from the parish while the allegation is investigated. Cardinal Cupich has appointed Father Larry Lisowski, pastor of Immaculate Conception and St. Joseph Parish, administrator of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish, effective immediately. Fr. Lisowski will retain his duties as pastor of Immaculate Conception and St. Joseph Parish and Archdiocesan Dean.

Fr. Lee has served the archdiocese in various roles, including:

• St. Christopher Parish (Midlothian), associate pastor, May 12, 1976 to June 30, 1979
• St. Matthias Parish (Ainslie Street, Chicago), associate pastor, May 23, 1979 to December 7, 1983
• Quigley Preparatory Seminary (North), faculty member, July 1, 1979 to December 31, 1986
• St. Giles Parish (Oak Park), associate pastor, December 7, 1983 to December 30, 1986
• Immaculate Conception Parish (North Park Avenue, Chicago), associate pastor, June 15, 1986 to April 14, 1987
• Immaculate Conception Parish (North Park Avenue, Chicago), pastor, April 14, 1987 to July 1, 2013
• St. Joseph Parish (N. Orleans Street, Chicago), pastor, July 1, 2001 to July 1, 2013
• Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish (Belmont Avenue, Chicago), pastor, July 1, 2013 to present

The Archdiocese of Chicago takes all allegations of sexual misconduct seriously and encourages anyone who feels they have been sexually abused by a priest, deacon, religious or lay employee, to come forward. Complete information about reporting sexual abuse can be found on the Archdiocesan website at www.archchicago.org.

 

CONTACT: 

Anne Maselli

Archdiocese of Chicago

312.534.8227

Anne.maselli@archchicagoorg

DEAR FR. Z:  IS THIS BERGOGLIO CREATURE REALLY THE POPE?

FAITHFUL OLD-FASHIONED NUNS HAVE THE MOST ECO-FRIENDLY LIFESTYLE

AS VENEZUELA’S MADURO STEALS YET ANOTHER TERM, AND THE BISHOPS, WORLD GOV’TS CONDEMN, COMMUNIST FRANCISVATICAN SENDS REPRESENTATIVE TO CEREMONY

WHY THE FRANCIS IS WRONG ABOUT NATIONALISM

JESUIT FRANCISPASTOR, JOHN WHITNEY: “RITUALIZED” ANAL INTERCOURSE IS MUCH, MUCH, DIFFERENT FROM “LOVING” ANAL INTERCOURSE, YOU SEE.

DRAG SHOWS, TWERKING, AND TRANSGENDER STUDENT HOUSING AT THE JESUIT’S SEATTLE U.

PATHEOS FAUX-CATHOLIC NIHILIST, REBECCA WEISS ON STEUBENVILLE HACK’S CREEPY, BLASPHEMOUS BOOK: THIS IS NOTHING OUT OF THE ORDINARY FOR CONSERVATIVE CATHOLIC ACADEMICS WHO ACTUALLY HAVE FUNCTIONING MENTAL APPARATUS.

THE ABUSE MAELSTROM ENGULFS THE NEW YEAR

A NEW YEAR OF THE CRIMINAL GAY CABAL:  IS THERE ANYWHERE IN THE CHURCH THIS POISON HAS NOT PERVADED YET?

MORE PIECES ADDED TO PUZZLE OF HOLY SEE PRESS OFFICE RESIGNATIONS

MOTHERS IN SHOCK AS DAUGHTERS COME HOME FROM COLLEGE WITH MUSTACHES, BREASTS REMOVED

REMOVE CREEPCARDINAL WUERL FROM THE D.C. FRANCISCHANCERY

“YES, THE LIBERATION THEOLOGY POPE ORDERED THE VATICAN TO COMMEMMORATE THE COMMUNIST TAKE-OVER OF CUBA AND THE 60 HORRENDOUS YEARS OF TYRANNY”

A NEWSPAPER HAS APOLOGISED FOR CLAIMING A PORTUGESE BISHOP MANUEL LINDA DENIED MARY’S VIRGINITY

USCCB PUNISHMENT RETREAT: “WHAT GOD IS SAYING TO US???” SERIOUSLY? I WOULD THINK “STOP BEING PERVERTS, PROTECTING PERVERTS, RECRUITING PERVERTS, ETC.” WOULD BE A NO BRAINER.”

LAWLER: THE ZANCHETTA CASE DEMONSTRATES THAT POPE FRANCIS CONTINUES TO PROTECT HIS FRIENDS AND ALLIES, REGARDLESS OF HIS PROFESSED COMMITMENT TO ACCOUNTABILITY.

R.R. RENO:  FRANCIS CUTS EVIL DEALS WITH THE GLOBALIST WEST LIKE HE DID WITH THE MURDEROUS CHICOMS

SATANIC ARROGANCE: HOLY USCCB FRANCISPREACHER THINKS THIS IS A GOLDEN AGE OF BISHOPS

WUERL KNEW. HE LIED. HE MUST GO!

CELEBRATE DEMOCRAT  ABORTIONS ! SHOUT FOR FEMINIST TERMINATIONS  !

SOCIAL JUSTICE FRANCISTOPIA: CHINESE UNIVERSITIES ISSUE ‘RELIGIOUS KNOWLEDGE CARDS’ – ““FOR PEOPLE WITH NO RELIGIOUS BELIEFS, IT’S A WARNING. FOR PEOPLE WHO HOLD RELIGIOUS BELIEFS, IT’S A THREAT.”

BUILD THE WALL OR THE UNITED STATES BECOMES A PRO-DEATH FAILED STATE LIKE CALIFORNIA OR VENEZUELA

DONALD WUERL: SHAMELESS LIAR

THE MESSAGE IS CLEAR TO ANY FORD EMPLOYEE OR CONTRACTOR, DISAGREE WITH THE TRANGENDER AGENDA, EVEN IN A WAY CONSISTENT WITH YOUR RELIGION AND YOU ARE OUT THE DOOR

NYT ATTEMPTS TO MAKE JPII LOOK LIKE SOME HERO OF LOSING POLISH FRANCISPOLITICS

MORE VICTIMS COMING FORWARD AGAINST ST. GALLEN FRANCISCONSPIRATOR, MCCARRICK

“CREDIBLY ACCUSED” BUT INNOCENT PRIESTS

NOT ALL CULTURES ARE EQUAL.  SOME CULTURES ARE BETTER THAN OTHERS

WE TRADITIONAL CATHOLICS ARE LIKE HERMITS IN THE DESERT

BALANCING WORK: MEN & WOMEN IN THE HOME

The foundational documents of our nation were influenced by Catholic political philosophers such as Aquinas, Suárez, Báñez, Gregory of Valencia and Saint Robert Bellarmine, who wrote before theorists like Hobbes and Rousseau. This contradicts a popular impression that democracy was the invention of the Protestant Reformation. Luther and Calvin considered popular assemblies highly suspect. The concept of the Divine Right of Kings, which was a prelude to what we call “statism” and “big government,” was systematized by the Protestant counselor to King James I of England, Robert Filmer.

For all his vague Deism, Thomas Jefferson might have acknowledged those Catholic sources, if obliquely, in his eloquent phrases. The Constitution’s First Amendment guarantee of the free exercise of religion and Article VI’s prohibition of religious tests for public office were developments rooted in the Thomistic outlines of human rights and dignity declared in the Magna Carta and the Declaration of Arbraoth.

This was lost on some senators who have violated Constitutional guarantees by subjecting judicial nominees to religious tests. One senator complained to a Catholic nominee for the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals that “the dogma lives loudly within you.” Two other senators said that the President’s nominee for a federal district court in Nebraska was unsuitable because his membership in the Knights of Columbus committed him to “a number of extreme positions.” Members of their political party consider opposition to same-sex marriage and abortion “extreme.” This would characterize the Pope as an extremist, but at least he is not a judicial nominee.

In the Statuary Hall of our nation’s Capitol are sculptures portraying heroes who represent the best of the history and culture of each state. They include Saint Junípero Serra of California, Saint Damien de Veuster of Hawaii, Declaration of Independence signer Charles Carroll of Maryland, Father Eusebio Kino of Arizona, General James Shields of Illinois, Chief Justice Edward Douglass White of Louisiana, Father Jacques Marquette of Wisconsin, Patrick McCarran of Nevada, Dennis Chavez of New Mexico, John Burke of North Dakota, John McLoughlin of Oregon, Mother Joseph of the Sacred Heart Pariseau of Washington, and John Edward Kenna of West Virginia, all of whom were Catholic. These canonized saints, statesmen, soldiers, jurists and pioneers would be extremists unworthy of public office in the estimation of some current senators for whom subscription to natural law and obedience to the Ten Commandments are violations of what they fantasize as the norm of moral being.

The coruscating illiteracy of such senators burlesques reason. At every performance of Mozart’s Don Giovanni, audiences wait for the fifth scene of the second act, when the haunting statue of the Commendatore comes alive and knocks on the door to the sound of trombones. Would that all those statues of some of our nation’s greatest figures might come down from their pedestals and challenge the vacant minds of those inquisitorial senators to explain what constitutes extremism.

 

Fr. George William Rutler, 1.12.19