A Roman Catholic priest replied “we are but men” when confronted after the son of a woman to whom he was providing spiritual guidance caught the clergyman having sex with his mother, according to court testimony in Texas on Wednesday.
That version of events emerged at the second day of the trial of Anthony Odiong, who has been criminally charged with illicitly abusing his status as a clergyman to pursue sex with spiritually vulnerable female congregants.
A son of one of those women, now 29, told jurors at the state courthouse in Waco, Texas, that he was about 14 in 2011 when his devoutly Catholic mother – fresh from a tumultuous divorce – hosted a party at the home she shared with her seven children. Among the guests was Anthony Odiong, who was a priest at a Catholic church attended by students and employees of Waco’s Baylor University, where the son’s mother worked.
Odiong had been meeting the mother frequently in the aftermath of her divorce, ostensibly to provide her with spiritual direction, in sessions at his office or even her home, according to the son and separate testimony on Wednesday from one of his younger sisters.
But the night of the party, he said he was locked in the woman’s bedroom with her, and the son – who had even been an altar server of Odiong – suddenly heard noises coming from behind the door. He burst in, saw a bottomless Odiong was lying on the floor atop his mother, and deduced they had been having sex.
The son said he ran to the home of a neighbor – Baylor theological seminary dean Todd Still – and, in a panic, described what he saw. Baylor’s longtime university chaplain and spiritual life dean Burt Burleson then learned about the situation from Still, and he testified on Wednesday that he relayed the “profoundly inappropriate” matter to a supervisor of Odiong at the Catholic diocese of Austin.
Burleson testified that he also confronted Odiong – and was surprised at the priest’s nonchalant reaction.
“We are but men,” Burleson recalled Odiong saying.
The son later spoke to a diocesan official. But he said he did not want to get anyone in trouble, especially his mother, who could be fired from Baylor if she was ever found to be conducting herself in a manner that was inconsistent with Christian values.
He said he told that official that what he saw with his mother and Odiong may have been ambiguous. He also acknowledged in court that a continuing battle with substance abuse had already started that night, when he had been drinking well under the legal age.
Odiong’s career largely continued unimpeded, with his spending time studying in Rome and eventually transferring to a church in the New Orleans suburb of Luling, Louisiana, until late 2023. His mother eventually saw a Guardian news story published after the end of Odiong’s time in Luling about other women who accused him of sexual coercion, unwanted touching and abusive financial control in his capacity as a priest, including in Texas.
The story described how a Texas state law considers it assault for clergymen to exploit congregants’ emotional dependency on them to engage in sexual conduct with them. The woman went to Waco police to report that Odiong had done that to her. That prompted an investigation that culminated in the identification of two more women Odiong was alleged to have assaulted by exploiting his clerical status, in criminal charges against him, and the trial in Waco.
Odiong, 57, pleaded not guilty on Wednesday to the five charges of first-degree and two counts of second-degree sexual assault that he faces. He could face life imprisonment if convicted on any of the first-degree charges.
Waco prosecutors Ryan Calvert and Liz Buice were able to secure criminal charges against Odiong without regard for how long ago his alleged crimes may have occurred because investigators established there were as many as 10 women the priest was suspected of sexually preying on.
In her opening statement, Buice indicated that she and Calvert planned to call at least some of those women as witnesses, even if not all of their cases resulted in formal charges against Odiong.
Prosecutors say their stories establish Odiong’s pattern of pursuing female congregants. And they have previously noted how – despite Catholic priests’ promise to practice sexual celibacy – there is evidence Odiong even had a child with one of the women whose case did not lead to formal charges against him.
The Guardian is not naming any of the women or those close to them as it generally does not identify people who allege they are sexual assault victims.
While cross-examining witnesses on Wednesday, Odiong’s attorney, Gerald Villarrial, sought to challenge the reliability of the recollections of the witnesses whose mother reported his client to police. He also established that other priests beside Odiong were known to go to that woman’s house – and questioned whether Odiong could ever carry out certain behaviors while, in a sense, he was off-duty from his role as a priest and was just a regular person.
But Calvert elicited witness testimony from Notre Dame University canon – or church – law lawyer John Paul Kimes that Roman Catholic priests like him and Odiong are never off the clock. And Kimes also testified that priests do hold a spiritual authority over congregants that they must take care to not exploit.
“We never stop being on duty,” said Kimes, whose credentials include an 11-year turn as a canon lawyer for the entity that handles Catholic clergy misconduct at the Vatican.
Odiong’s trial could last through at least Monday.
