HONESDALE — A former United Methodist Church minister charged with molesting a boy repeatedly over a 10-year period asked for a formal preliminary hearing during an appearance Wednesday in Wayne County Central Court.

Norman T. Faux, 54, of 1811 Lake Ariel Highway, Lake Twp., is accused of abusing the boy, now 19, from the time the boy was 9 years old until a few weeks ago.

Mr. Faux will now have a preliminary hearing scheduled before Magisterial District Judge Bonnie L. Carney. The time was not set.

State police in Honesdale charged Mr. Faux with involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with someone less than 16 years old and involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child, three counts of aggravated indecent assault and one count of indecent assault.

Mr. Faux was arraigned Saturday, was unable to post $150,000 bail and was jailed in Wayne County Correctional Facility. He asked for a reduction in bail during Wednesday's proceeding but was denied by Magisterial District Judge Ted Mikulak. Unable to post bail, he was sent back to prison.

Police said the abuse was discovered when the victim's girlfriend checked his cellphone and found an obscene text message. In the message, Mr. Faux asked to perform oral sex on the victim.

The girlfriend told her mother, who contacted Wayne County Children and Youth Services. On Friday, the girlfriend's mother took the victim in for an interview with caseworkers. He told them Mr. Faux began to assault him when he was 9 years old in 2004 and continued for a decade, most recently a few weeks ago.

When the boy was 11 years old, he began watching pornographic videos as a distraction while Mr. Faux performed oral sex on him. The boy said it happened so many times he couldn't say how often it occurred.

The Times-Tribune does not identify victims of sexual assault.

Mr. Faux faced a Methodist church trial in July 2011, when he voluntarily formally surrendered his credentials as a minister. The Scranton District of the Susquehanna Conference of the United Methodist Church had accused him of sexually abusing a parishioner.

He was suspended as a minister a year earlier. At the time, Mr. Faux was a pastor at the Lake Ariel and Centenary United Methodist churches. It was unclear where the abuse in that case occurred or the connection of that case to this one.

Mr. Faux also is believed to have started a nondenominational independent religious group in Lake Twp. after 2011 known as the Lake Ariel Faith Fellowship, Wayne County District Attorney Janine Edwards said Wednesday in a statement after the court hearing.

Meanwhile, Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, the outreach director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, issued a statement Wednesday praising the victim's girlfriend for her role in getting the abuse reported, and urging authorities to thoroughly investigate the matter.

"We are extremely grateful to the brave witness who reported what she knew to an adult, who reported it to police," Ms. Dorris stated. "When victims, witnesses and whistle-blowers speak up, children are safer."

Contact the writer:

jlockwood@timesshamrock.com, @jlockwoodTT on Twitter; bkrawczeniuk@timesshamrock.com