A Butler County priest has been placed on administrative leave amid allegations of sexual abuse of a minor.

The Rev. Joseph Feltz, 65, who retired in October as pastor of St. Christopher at the Lake Parish, 229 N. Franklin St., Prospect, is accused of sexual abuse of a minor in the mid-1980s. Bishop David Zubik of the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh announced the suspension in a news release issued after 5 p.m. Saturday.

The allegation was made by way of a recent lawsuit against the diocese, according to the news release, which added that Feltz has denied the allegations, and that the diocese has reported the allegations to law enforcement.

Feltz is one of four priests not previously accused of sexual abuse who were named in a lawsuits filed Thursday in Allegheny County against the Pittsburgh diocese.

Feltz and the other three priests — the Revs. Peter Pilarski, John Unger and George Leech — were not named in the statewide grand jury report released in August.

According to published news reports, a 48-year-old man said he was 9 or 10 years old and an altar boy at a church in suburban south Pittsburgh when he was repeatedly abused by a group of priests that included Feltz. The abuse would have happened in the 1970s; Feltz would have been in his late-20s.

Feltz became pastor of St. Christopher in February 2010. Before that he was an administrator of St. Anthony Parish in Monongahela for 14 years, according to Butler Eagle records.

See more information in Monday's Butler Eagle.