NEW JERSEY
He knew of sex abuse allegations on campus. Now he’s university president.

Monsignor Joseph Reilly was elevated to the top position at Seton Hall just three years after stepping back from leadership.


Msgr. Joseph R. Reilly S.T.L., Ph.D., is Seton Hall University President. | Seton Hall University via PRWeb

By DUSTIN RACIOPPI
12/21/2024 07:00 AM EST

SOUTH ORANGE, New Jersey — Monsignor Joseph Reilly started as a student at Seton Hall University 45 years ago and rose the ranks of the prestigious Catholic institution, becoming one of its most influential figures. Then he left his position in 2022, with little fanfare.

Unknown to the public, Reilly had been implicated in the fallout of defrocked Cardinal Theodore McCarrick’s sexual abuse scandal that rocked the church all the way up to the Vatican — called out in a secretive internal investigation that concluded Reilly knew of sexual abuse allegations that he did not report. Investigators, while not accusing him of abuse, recommended, pursuant to a responsive action plan the school’s governing body adopted, Reilly be removed as a seminary leader and member of university boards, according to interviews and documents reviewed by POLITICO and being reported for the first time.

Less than three years after he stepped aside, Seton Hall has decided to ignore those findings, restoring Reilly to active service and, in recent weeks, formally elevating him to the most powerful position possible: university president.

It did so with the approval of the Archdiocese of Newark, led by Cardinal Joseph Tobin. “I have no doubt that you’re the right person at the right time for Seton Hall,” Tobin told Reilly at his November investiture ceremony, saying he had the “the voice of a shepherd.”

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