Fr. Leo Connolly, Pastor, Zanesville St. Nicholas
Priest and Volunteer Police Chaplain in the Columbus Diocese for 28 years

“Serving as a police chaplain is life-giving. It gets in your blood. Spending time working with the Sheriff’s Office is very relaxing,” said Fr. Connolly. “I will always remember my first chase; it was a 13-year-old boy who stole a car. Fortunately, there were no injuries.”

Fr. Connolly, originally from Philadelphia, attended seminary at Catholic University in Washington D.C. as a young man. One afternoon, he and some seminarian brothers had an opportunity to ride along with Metropolitan Police Department. He enjoyed the experience—and little did he know he’d still be doing it 28 years later.

After his ordination to the priesthood in at his parish church, Columbus Holy Spirit, Fr. Connolly was assigned as Associate Pastor at Hilliard St. Brendan. The man who ran security for bingo there was a non-Catholic sergeant with the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office, and they became friends.

“He asked me to ride along with the patrol division as he responded to calls,” said Fr. Connolly. “The sergeant had a deputy with some marital problems and he said that if I ride along maybe it would come up and I could help.”

Since that time, Fr. Connolly has been riding along and helping out in many different ways as a police chaplain with the Franklin County Sherriff’s Office.

“After they get to know you, you can get out of the car and help. Once they begin to trust you and see that you aren’t going to preach to them, judge them, or interfere with their work, they realize that maybe having a clergy resource with them is a good idea,” said Fr. Connolly. “They like my help with domestic disputes, suicide situations and death notifications.”

Fr. Connolly read a book about a Detroit police chaplain and decided he wanted to pursue police chaplaincy more seriously. He slowly gained the trust of the deputies he rode with.

“They get to know you and they began to realize that I wasn’t going to cram religion down their throat. Still, they try to shock you. They test you. They throw things at you to see how you respond. They don’t want to be converted. They just want to do their job.”

Fr. Connolly helps, especially in tragic situations, such as car accident deaths. “The deputies have a hard time notifying the family that a loved one has died, so I started doing that. Then they thought that having me around was a good thing especially with death notifications. The deputies asked if I would be a police chaplain.”

As Fr. Connolly began training as a police chaplain, he was still an Associate Pastor in a parish and working at the Diocesan Tribunal. Even though he began to get more involved in chaplaincy, Fr. Connolly has stayed focused on his role in the parish as the top priority.

He became a member of the International Order of Police Chaplains and received non-denominational law enforcement chaplaincy training; this is much like preparing for military chaplaincy, with rank.

He continues with this training at the national and regional levels today, and in fact, he is currently Chair of Credentials for police chaplains who are advancing through the chaplaincy ranks. “I don’t know how I would have done it without the classes. They help you learn what to do and say in different situations and what reactions to expect.”

His role as he “rides along” varies. He is often asked to counsel and console victims and perpetrators. He helps with car accidents, hostage situations, and as he became friends with deputies, he began serving them in other ways. He often works alongside other experts, such as psychologists, at the scene of a crime.

“I became friends with the deputies and they asked me to do weddings, baptisms, funerals for family member and also police line-of-duty deaths. I never replace anyone’s own pastor, and as a police chaplain, one must always follow the rules of one’s own denomination,” said Fr. Connolly.

He also had to learn radio codes, “the radio is a language all its own. It you learn the codes, the deputies can really use your help responding in emergencies.”

A police chaplain is a volunteer position. A chaplain wears a uniform much like a deputy with a patch that says ‘Chaplain’ and patches with a cross on each shoulder.

“The deputies are respectful to me as a chaplain. They see me as a person of rank.”

He describes his work as “evangelizing without preaching. It is so good for people to see that clergy are real people too. I help them see that sometimes things are not black and white. Not everyone is guilty. They live in a world that they see as good guys and bad guys and it just isn’t always that way.”

He adds: “there are many unchurched people in the public and in the police community. Sometimes I feel more like a priest in those situations than I do every day in the parish.”

Fr. Connolly also works on a Disaster Response Team and was a first responder to Ground Zero on September 11th, 2001. He also assisted at the Houston Astrodome after Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana.

Locally, Fr. Connolly served as a chaplain for the Portsmouth Police Department when assigned to Holy Redeemer Parish and the-Jackson and Wellston Police Departments when he was assigned to Sts. Peter and Paul Parish in Wellston. He then returned to the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office when serving at St. Philip Parish, Columbus prior to his Zanesville assignment

In 2003, he was assigned to Zanesville St. Nicholas where he currently serves as Pastor. He works with the Zanesville Police Department and the Muskingum County Sherriff’s Office. He also still serves the Franklin County Sherriff’s Office with line-of-duty activities only.

“This is a ministry, and I am part of their family, and I can really make a difference as a priest.”