Tears of sadness flowed that Sunday morning in June 1986. After nine years, parishioners at Charlotte's Our Lady of the Assumption Catholic Church were saying goodbye to the Rev. Joseph Kelleher - better known to them as "Father Joe," their pastor.
In the months leading up to this farewell Mass, many church members had written angry, frustrated letters to the bishop, protesting the reassignment of this charismatic priest with the Irish brogue to a parish in Asheville.
Popular, even beloved, Kelleher, then 58, was particularly close to young people. That's the portrait that emerges, from interviews and past newspaper articles, of the priest now alleged to be part of a child sex abuse scandal that has rocked the Roman Catholic Church worldwide.
This month, more than two decades after that emotional send-off, one former member of his flock at Our Lady of the Assumption has come forward to accuse the priest of sexually abusing him in the church rectory in January 1981. According to Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police, who are investigating but have made no arrest in the case, the accuser was 13 years old at the time.
The Charlotte allegation came barely a week after Kelleher was arrested by Albemarle police on a charge that he abused a 14-year-old boy in 1977 when he was pastor of Our Lady of the Annunciation in Albemarle. He's expected to make his first court appearance next month.
Kelleher, who served at Our Lady of Lourdes in Raleigh for about a year during 1969-1970, has been serving in recent years as chaplain at Bishop McGuinness High School in Kernersville. He was put on administrative leave by the Diocese of Charlotte, which is conducting its own investigation. Being on leave means that Kelleher, a Trappist monk-turned-parish priest, is not permitted to publicly celebrate Mass or wear priestly garb in public for the first time since he was ordained at 19. He's now 82.
'Justice' for Kelleher
The accusations have led not only to investigations, headlines and an arrest; they've also caused an outpouring of support for Kelleher, much of it from Catholics who knew him when they were young.
In vigils and on the Internet, they say they never experienced or heard of any inappropriate behavior by Kelleher when they got to know him as altar boys or on beach trips.
More than 1,100 people have joined a Facebook site called "Justice for Father Kelleher," with a logo that includes shamrocks - a nod to Kelleher's Irish roots.
Seth Langston, a Charlotte attorney representing the Albemarle accuser, said his client would have no comment now in the criminal case.
But in the wake of the Facebook site and Kelleher vigils in Winston Salem and Charlotte, Langston said he hoped the priest's supporters "would keep an open mind. And pray for any victims as well as the priest. And hope the truth comes out, whatever it is."
Langston declined to comment on the particulars of the Kelleher case, but did say, "I think it's obvious the more victims who come forward, the more credible the [Albemarle] allegation."
Michael Joseph Kelleher was born in County Cork, Ireland, and, for much of the 1960s and 1970s, was considered the Charlotte expert on all things Irish.
Another part of his biography also made him something of a curiosity in a Charlotte that was still a mostly Protestant place. That is, he spent the first 18 years of his priesthood as a Trappist monk, first in Ireland, then in New Zealand. He rose at 2 a.m. to pray, farm and keep silent, then went to bed at 7 p.m.
'Nothing untoward'
In 1965, Kelleher decided he could best serve as a parish priest. Pope Paul VI released him from his monastic vows, and he headed for the United States. He arrived in North Carolina in 1966, and has never left, serving in 12 parishes and at Bishop McGuinness High School.
Charlotte attorney Bob Hull, now 56, met Kelleher when the priest came to Dilworth's St. Patrick Cathedral in 1966.
"He was funny, he was loud, he was boisterous," Hull said. "If people weren't singing loud enough at Mass, he'd get the organist to stop and start again. Just a lovable man. And he could be a grumpy man."
Kelleher named Hull head altar boy, and the two spent a lot of time together. Nothing remotely inappropriate ever happened, Hull said.
"I'd put the altar boy schedule together, get on my bike, ride over to the church, typically on a Friday or Saturday," said Hull. "Oftentimes, after delivering the schedule, I'd hang around, have dinner at the rectory, just me and him and maybe a cook."
After dinner, Hull said, he and Kelleher would sometimes go - after Hull called his parents for permission - to a movie at the Manor Theatre or take in a Charlotte Hornets baseball game.
"Absolutely nothing untoward [occurred]," Hull said, "and I never heard of anything happening [to anybody else]."
Hull said he never considered it strange that he'd spend a Friday or Saturday night out with a priest.
"Did it occur to me then that that was unusual? The answer was 'no.' And it wasn't unusual," he said. "Would I let my 12-year-old do that now? Certainly, if I knew the priest as well as my parents knew Father Kelleher."
