Neighbors Who See Stabbing Kick Ass
Did a Priest Make it Snow?
Friday, September 12, 2008 at 1:37 pm
According to authorities in Illinois, Father Christopher Layden, age 33, didn't just dispense forgiveness and hear confession -- he may have been dealing coke along with the eucharist and blood of Christ.
As a result of an investigation into Layden's time at the Newman Center at the University of Illinois, the priest has been transfigured from clerical authority into accused drug dealer and user. On Thursday this week, Father Layden pled innocent to two counts of delivery of less than 1 gram of coke within a thousand feet of a church and another count of possession with intent to deliver. According to the News-Gazette, Layden's alleged possession and use of drugs in or around church property makes the allegations all the more serious.
Here's what supposedly happened -- an informant gave police a "detailed taped statement" regarding "a priest at the Newman Center Catholic Church" dealing coke out of offices there. The informant said the priest was Christopher Layden. The informant also told of snorting lines with Layden off the surface of a framed photo of Layden standing with a bishop.
The police informant also told of going to Chicago with the priest to buy cocaine. But the real kicker may have been those times the cops monitored the informant buying coke from Father Layden.
So the priest who claimed he would take casual walks with no less than Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger -- now Pope Benedict XVI -- during his 5 years studying in Rome was given a $50,000 bond. He met the bond and was released.
In a 2003 editorial in the Madison Catholic Herald, Fr. Layden was quoted in reference to the sexual abuse scandals that have dogged the Catholic Church in the last decade. He spoke of "asking the Holy Spirit to guide us in what we can do to assist our brother priests." To that end, Layden helped write a novena for priests to affirm the working clergy who felt so under siege by that scandal.
Looks like he could use his own special novena, now.
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