The Newman Center

Several people have asked me about the priest who was arrested for selling drugs at St. John's. It made not only the national news, but had the dubious distinction of getting air time on SNL's Weekend Update. Imagine my shock to see Amy Poehler making fun of my beloved Newman Center. It really broke my heart.
I don't know the priest, I've never met him and I've never heard him say Mass. People that Kevin and I know working at St. John's said they were just as surprised as everyone else and don't know any more than what the rest of us are seeing on the news.
There is no excuse for this and the priest deserves whatever his punishment ends up being. At the same time he is a human being like all others who become addicted to drugs and I hope that he also gets the treatment and rehabilitation he needs to break the addiction.
Priests fall into that category of people like teachers, politicians, police officers, etc. who are accountable to society to an even greater degree for their actions because of the position of influence they have, especially influence over young people, in this case college students. When you decide to become a priest I believe it must be with the understanding that your life is even more of an open book than the average person and your actions must be beyond reproach.
The Newman Foundation at the U of I has been doing amazing work for students both Catholic and Non-Catholic for over 100 years. Many, many priests and other religious have worked there tirelessly, changing the lives of students for decades and carrying out their vocations with excellence. There are thousands of Newman Alumni all over the country who discovered who they really are and the meaning of their lives at the U of I Newman Center. I know quite a few people for whom that is true. St. John's just completed a multi-million dollar expansion project to improve and add on to the dorm and cafeteria so that even more students could be reached for Christ. In addition, there are more vocations (meaning, people who decide to be priests and nuns) that come from St. John's than anywhere else in the country. People from other college Newman centers all over the country come to the U of I to study what goes on at St. John's and do it that way at their own schools. Now this one bad apple priest comes along and the thing that gets Newman on the national news is, look at this, another crazy priest, they must all be crazy, another priest who "proves" that the Catholic Church is a joke just like we thought it was. Not the multitude of other fantastic priests who have worked there, not the hundreds and hundreds of couples who met and got married there, not all the service trips local and around the country, not the thousands of hours Catholic students spend at the soup kitchen, not the Bible studies, none of that gets mentioned. Now it is "the place where the priest sold drugs from his office." I am so sad for all the people who have lost their faith because of this, and so sad for the parents who sent their kids away to college for the first time to live at the Newman Center and this happens just as school is starting. How scary for those parents to think that is what St. John's is like, to not trust where their kids are at now.
In the end we have to trust that God is in control and that all things work for good, we have to pray for Father Layden that he can be healed and pray that the Bishop makes a good and sensible decision about his future as a priest. Most of all pray for Newman Alumni who are so saddened by this, and especially for the current students and their parents who must be very angry about being deceived.