Virginia priest indicted for stealing church funds

Published: 2007-01-25

RICHMOND, Va. (CNS) -- Father Rodney L. Rodis, 50, a recently retired priest of the Richmond Diocese, has been indicted and arrested on charges that he embezzled at least $600,000 and possibly more than $1 million from St. Jude Parish in Mineral and Immaculate Conception Parish in Buckner. He became administrator of the two central Virginia parishes in 1993 and was their pastor from 1994 until he took early retirement for health reasons last May. When he was arrested parishioners were surprised to learn that since the mid-1990s he had been living with a woman and three children in a house in Fredericksburg, which is in the neighboring Diocese of Arlington. Neighbors in Fredericksburg told the Richmond Times-Dispatch daily newspaper that they did not know he was a priest and that he had referred to the woman as his wife for the past decade. The Times-Dispatch said the property's deed of trust lists Rodney Rodis and Joyce F. Sillador-Rodis as husband and wife.

Copyright (c) 2007 Catholic News Service /U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. The CNS news report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed, including but not limited to such means as framing or any other digital copying or distribution method, in whole or in part without the prior written authority of Catholic News Service .