Priest-chaplains

PATERSON  For police chaplains, it’s all about building relationships with the officers they serve in good times, such as baptizing their children, to the tough times, such as talking them through the pressures and stresses of their job and some of the horrors they have experienced or witnessed.

Sometimes in the line of duty, officers get caught up in violent situations, such as shootings, and see gruesome murders, unspeakable brutality and grizzly accidents, said Father Geno Sylva, a chaplain for the FBI and Passaic County Sheriff’s Office.

“There are some dark things that officers see or experience that they don’t want to bring back home. They need someone to share them with and someone who will put their arms around them when they are crying,” said Msgr. Sylva, rector of the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist here and diocesan vicar for special projects. He has been a chaplain to the FBI officially since 2008 with service to the agency at Ground Zero after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and to the Passaic County Sheriff’s Department since 2018, while also ministering informally to members of the Paterson Police Department. “We chaplains make an impact. We help these officers make sense of the insanity — the evil — and help them still believe that beauty still exists in the world. We try to bring officers hope and healing,” he said.

In other times, chaplains and other priests reach out to police officers who are hospitalized because of injuries or are dying and to the families of officers, who are sick, dying or are deceased. He told The Beacon about visiting St. Joseph’s Regional Medical Center, Paterson, to anoint and pray over Anthony Lucanto, a Paterson police officer, before he died on Nov. 5 of 9/11-related health issues. The priest also spent time with his family.

In a moment in the United States when the actions of law enforcement have come under critical scrutiny by some in society, including movements to defund law enforcement, The Beacon spoke with law enforcement chaplains to learn more about the joys and challenges of their ministry.

On Wednesdays, Msgr. Sylva travels to his office in FBI headquarters in Federal Plaza in New York City, where he spends time visiting each squad so he gets to know the agents and employees. He also comes in for emergency situations, such as “debriefing” — or counseling — agents and their families after a shooting, terrorist act or an agents’ death on duty. During the year, he also participants in various ceremonies, including memorial services for officers killed in the field.

Msgr. Sylva serves with chaplains of other faith traditions and previously worked in the FBI’s Newark office. He also worked with the FBI’s legate office in the U.S. embassy to the Holy See during his five-year assignment in Rome as the English-lan­guage official for the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization.

“The pressures of the job of keeping people safe, it’s such a noble job and mission they have, so any way that we can help them to keep that joy, keep that faith, is a priority,” said Msgr. Sylva, who called serving as an FBI chaplain “one of the greatest honors of my life.” He also called the men and women of the bureau “some of the finest people I’ve ever met in my life.”

Likewise, Msgr. Sylva praised many of the Paterson and Passaic County police officers as “some of the most truly holy people I have met who inspire me with their kindness and sense of mission.” An example he recalled was when police stopped by to help St. John’s Young Prophets youth ministry in August distribute food and treats to children of the neighborhood on a Friday night.

Father Michael Drury, a retired diocesan priest, serves as chaplain of the U.S. Secret Service, the N.J. State Police and the Mend­ham Borough and Mendham Township police departments. He said he also understands the need to cultivate close personal relationships with officers. He serves the Philadelphia Office of the Secret Service, which guards the President and his family as well as other federal officials and visiting dignitaries. He serves Troop B of the State Police, which covers a territory from Totowa, up north to Sussex County and out west from Route 78 to the Pennsylvania border.

For the past three months, Father Drury has been involved in videoconferencing meetings with Secret Service officials who have been working from home but will soon return to making the 75-mile trip to the Philadelphia Office. He became affiliated with the agency three years ago through Jim Henry, special agent in charge of the office, and a parishioner of St. Luke Parish in Long Valley where the priest formerly served as pastor. He participated in a federal training program for chaplains, he said.

Father Drury said he first became active in police chaplaincy with the Mendham Borough and Township departments in the early 1980s. He has been a full-time police chaplain since he retired from active ministry as a diocesan priest last year.

With their work with the Secret Service, chaplains stay with one of the agents at an event for the entire time in case a situation arises. Father Drury had attended many political rallies and a speech of President Trump where he got to meet him.

“The President saw my priestly collar, came over and thanked me for my service,” he said.

With local or state police, Father Drury is sometimes called in to headquarters for a debriefing if an officer was involved in a shooting or witnessed a horrible auto accident, a violent crime, death of a child or a suicide. The meeting might include other officers on the scene, including the commanding officer, the priest said.

“Chaplains need to gain the trust of officers so they have the confidence to call them when something terrible happens. It’s an ecumenical position; we serve all people,” said Father Drury, one of three chaplains of different faith traditions. Responsibilities also include accompanying officers in making death notifications, said the priest, who noted, “We help people get through difficult moments in their lives so they can get to the next. I am proud to be a chaplain.”
 

MOUNTAIN LAKES  Four priests of the Diocese joined clergy of other denominations in participating in training for chaplains to law enforcement and first-responders offered by the Mountain Lakes Police Department on Oct. 12–13.

Diocesan priests were: Father Michael Parisi, diocesan vicar general and pastor of St. Catherine of Siena Parish, Mountain Lakes; Father Michal Rybinski, St. Catherine’s parochial vicar; Father Kevin Corcoran, pastor of Corpus Christi Parish, Chatham Township; and Father Kamil Kiszka, parochial vicar of Our Lady of the Lake Parish, Sparta.

The course was developed by the department’s Police Chaplain Program, which creates a partnership with various faith-based leaders of a community to respond and assist police, other law-enforcement agencies and first-responders in providing an overall better quality response to the citizens of cities and communities. Course topics included domestic violence; officer injury, death and ceremonies; managing stress and critical incidents; law enforcement family and death notification.