Pope Francis has ordered the reopening of the controversial trial against the renowned Slovenian Jesuit priest Marko Rupnik, who is accused of abuse of power and psychological and sexual abuse against several nuns. Known as a successful and charismatic religious artist, Rupnik is the author of mosaics that decorate churches around the world, including Madrid’s La Almudena Cathedral. Last June he was expelled from the Jesuits, the order to which Bergoglio belongs.
The Vatican’s handling of his case had drawn widespread criticism. Rupnik’s victims had denounced that no one had listened to them and criticized that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which is responsible for analyzing cases of abuse, had not sanctioned the Jesuits for these crimes, which date back to the 1990s, and had decided to prescribe them had.
As the Holy See said in a statement on Friday, the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors reported in September “to the Pope of serious problems in the handling of the case of Father Marko Rupnik and the lack of closeness to the victims.” After receiving this complaint, Pope Francis “asked the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith to examine the case and decided not to prescribe it to allow a trial to take place.”
The statement said: “The Pope is firmly convinced that one thing the Church should learn from the Synod is to listen with attention and compassion to those who suffer, especially to those who feel excluded from the Church.”
The possible opening of a new canonical process could, among other things, result in Rupnik’s exclusion from the priesthood.
The announcement marked an important turning point in the handling of the case. The intervention of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors is significant because the twenty nuns who denounced Rupnik were adults at the time of the abuse. The terminology used in the statement, which speaks of “closeness to the victims,” is also relevant, since the church authorities had previously refused to even consider the women who denounced Rupnik as “victims.”
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The reported events date back to the early 1990s and involved alleged psychological and sexual abuse of nuns from the Slovenian Loyola community in Ljubljana, founded by a religious man whose friend and spiritual father was Rupnik.
The case broke out about a year ago, but it was already known in church circles. The Jesuits admitted after an internal investigation that Rupnik had been sanctioned with some restrictions.
As the Jesuits explained, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, which is responsible for canonical processes related to sexual abuse, “received a complaint in 2021 against Father Marko Ivan Rupnik about his manner of carrying out his ministry.”
The Society of Jesus was then commissioned to initiate a preliminary investigation and “after examining the results, the Vatican Dicastery concluded that the events in question should be considered time-barred and therefore closed the case at the beginning of October of this year 2022.”
The Society of Jesus noted at the time that the women’s complaints appeared “very credible.” But he said the Vatican’s canonical norms in place at the time of the alleged abuse prevented harsher punishments for older cases of abuse involving adults.
While the investigation was ongoing, several precautionary measures were taken against Father Rupnik, such as “prohibiting the practice of the sacrament of confession, spiritual direction and accompaniment in spiritual exercises.” The Jesuits said in June, when they announced the religious’s expulsion, that Rupnik had repeatedly violated the restrictions imposed on him.
The case is full of shadows and is causing headaches for the Vatican and Pope Francis himself. Last year it was revealed that the faith had already excommunicated Rupnik in 2020 – the harshest punishment in the church – for “acquitting an accomplice of a sin against the sixth commandment.” That is, the priest had used the confessional in 2018 to acquit a nun with whom he had had sexual relations – he had allegedly abused her – by forcing her to remain silent: one of the most serious canonical crimes. The surprising thing is that the excommunication was lifted shortly afterwards with an extraordinary act. It is unknown why this decision was made.
Some media pointed out that the Pope was the only authority capable of doing this, and also highlighted the suspicions that the lifting of the excommunication had caused, considering that at that time the Prefect of the Doctrine of the Faith was the Spanish Luis Ladaria , who is also a Jesuit. Others pointed out that Father Rupnik’s sentence could have been appealed and later converted into other types of sanctions.