{"id":3495,"date":"2007-01-13T22:42:15","date_gmt":"2007-01-13T22:42:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/viamedia\/2007\/01\/he-was-always-vague-about-what-he-did.html"},"modified":"2007-01-13T22:42:15","modified_gmt":"2007-01-13T22:42:15","slug":"he-was-always-vague-about-what-he-did","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/01\/he-was-always-vague-about-what-he-did.html","title":{"rendered":"“He was always vague about what he did”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Virginia priest who stands accused of stealing hundreds of thousands from his parishes…was married. <\/a><\/p>\n

(Civilly, we can assume.)<\/p>\n

\n
\n

A document included in papers committing Rodis to jail listed him as living with a wife and three children in Fredericksburg, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported Saturday. It wasn’t clear whether Rodis is the children’s father. <\/p>\n

"It’s not a crime for someone to be married, but I imagine there might be some people mad at him over that," Louisa Commonwealth’s Attorney R. Don Short told The Associated Press on Saturday. <\/p>\n

The Catholic Diocese of Richmond was surprised to hear about Rodis’ living arrangements, diocese lawyer William Etherington said, as were neighbors in the subdivision where the family had lived in a two-story brick home for at least eight years. <\/p>\n

Bev King, who used to live near Rodis, said she was "totally dumbfounded" to hear he was a priest. <\/p>\n

Neighbors said Rodis–who lived with a woman he referred to as his wife and a daughter about 20, one in her early teens and another as young as 5–told them he was in the import-export business. They said he often was gone for days or weeks at a time. <\/p>\n

"I did think there was something strange," King said. "He was always vague about what he did." <\/p>\n

More:<\/a><\/p>\n

The Rev. Rodney L. Rodis yesterday denied that he is married. But he said the woman he lives with knew he was a Catholic priest before he was accused of embezzling funds from two churches. <\/p>\n

Rodis, who answered the front door of his Spotsylvania County home last night, declined to comment on whether any of the three girls who have lived in the home are his daughters.<\/p>\n

Rodis, 50, confirmed that Joyce Sillador lives at the home, but he said, "No," when asked if they are married. Asked if she knew he was a priest before an investigation into more than $600,000 missing from two Louisa County parishes, he replied, "Yes, she did."<\/p>\n

snip<\/em><\/p>\n

Diocesan officials say they were surprised to hear of Rodis’ living arrangements. Neighbors say his lifestyle showed no evidence of opulence. They say Rodis, the woman they know as Joyce and the children took trips and remodeled the home, including putting in new hardwood floors. The three vehicles parked in the driveway include two Toyota sport-utility vehicles and an older-model Ford Escort station wagon. Two neighbors say Rodis told them the oldest girl, in her early 20s, was attending medical school in the Philippines.<\/p>\n

The family invited neighbors over for Christmas and birthday celebrations and also held a party when the youngest girl, then several months old, was baptized at St. Mary of the Immaculate Conception Catholic Church in Fredericksburg, which is part of the Diocese of Arlington. A man answering the phone at the St. Mary’s parish office yesterday said neither Sillador nor Rodis is listed in the church directory.<\/p>\n

Rodis has been living in the United States since 1991 and has been leader of the combined Louisa County parishes since 1993. He was ordained a priest in the Order of St. Camillus in the Philippines on March 25, 1986.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Virginia priest who stands accused of stealing hundreds of thousands from his parishes…was married. (Civilly, we can assume.) A document included in papers committing Rodis to jail listed him as living with a wife and three children in Fredericksburg, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported Saturday. It wasn’t clear whether Rodis is the children’s father. 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(Civilly, we can assume.) A document included in papers committing Rodis to jail listed him as living with a wife and three children in Fredericksburg, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported Saturday. It wasn’t clear whether Rodis is the children’s father. 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The Catholicism comes from her side. Amy grew up in a number of places - Indiana - Washington, DC - Lubbock Texas - Arlington, Virginia - DeKalb, Illinois - Lawrence, Kansas - and Knoxville, Tennessee, where the family settled in 1973. She attended Knoxville Catholic High School, then the University of Tennessee where she majored in history. She received an MA in Church History from Vanderbilt University, where she wrote a thesis on the changing role of women in 19th century American Protestantism, and the ways Scripture was used to justify those changes. She worked as as a teacher in Catholic high schools and a Parish Director of Religious Education and started writing for the diocesan press - the Florida Catholic - in 1988. Amy has written columns for Our Sunday Visitor and Catholic News Service at times over the past twenty years. Her articles have been published in venues ranging from Our Sunday Visitor to the New York Times to Commonweal. She has written 17 books. 18, if you included the as yet tragically unpublished novel. Amy has five children, ranging in age from 26 to 4 and was married to Michael Dubruiel, who died unexpectedly in February 2009. She lives in Birmingham, Alabama.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/author\/awelborn"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/180"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3495\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}