Collaboration needed to run Five Towns churches

Due to a reduction in the number of priests, a few religious leaders in the Five Towns area have been performing double duty for both the local churches and the Diocese of Rockville Centre that oversees Catholic parishes throughout Long Island.

At Our Lady of Good Counsel Church in Inwood, Father Eric Fasano works in tandem with Father Tom Moriarty. Fasano is also a full-time judge for the Diocese’s tribunal and Moriarty is the administrator at Good Counsel in addition to being the priest at St. Joseph’s Church in Hewlett.

Consolidating resources and manpower was needed due to the declining number of priests, Moriarty said. Less men went into the priesthood in the 1970s and ‘80s and the shortage has continued with current retirements.

Three Five Towns churches, Our Lady of Good Counsel, St. Joseph’s, and St. Joachim in Cedarhurst, share resources. “St. Joachim is a very small church,” Moriarty said, adding that it has few programs. “The children there can go to Our Lady of Good Counsel or St. Joseph’s for religious education.”

Fasano said that there had been, “an idea in the works to get the three parishes in the Five Towns area to start cooperating in terms of sharing resources and priestly coverage.”

As a tribunal judge, Fasano assists the bishop in areas of canon law, mostly hearing marriage cases. “Like the U.S. military, the church has its own internal legal system that is governed by the code of canon law,” Fasano said. “It sets up the structure for the church.”

The code of law in the tribunal outlines the relationships between people, places, things and property, Fasano explained. “I’m usually in the tribunal four days a week and the rest of the time I’m taking care of the parish at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church,” Fasano said.