The Vatican has expelled Theodore McCarrick, the former American cardinal accused of sexual abuse

Pope Francis sent former 88-year-old American cardinal Theodore McCarrick to the secular state, accused of having badually abused at least one teenager nearly half a century ago, said Saturday a Vatican statement.

It is the first time in the history of the Catholic Church that a cardinal is excluded for reasons of badual abuse.

The Argentine Pope has declared a definite sentence in this sense of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Vatican Institution that ensures respect for Catholic dogma, said a statement from the Holy See.

This sentence, without appeal and therefore final, takes place just before a crucial meeting, from 21 to 24 February, with the presidents of episcopal conferences around the world at the Vatican, where they will examine the responsibility of the prelates who have remained silent about the badual badaults committed against minors clergy

The big scandals that broke out in the United States, Chile or Germany, tarnished the credibility of the Catholic Church.

Pope Francis who wants to apply his promise of "zero tolerance"He promised in recent months that he would be uncompromising with the high ecclesiastical hierarchy.

The former president emeritus of Washington had already been banned in July to exercise his ministry and then resigned from his title of cardinal. With his official exclusion from the Church, the man currently detained in the state of Kansasin the United States, he simply becomes Theodore McCarrick.

The Holy See requested in September 2017 investigation at the New York archdiocese after the testimony of a man who accused the prelate of having badually abused in the 70s.

Faced with "serious clues" revealed during the investigation, the pope removed Bishop McCarrick from his title of cardinal at the end of July.

This case has shaken the hierarchy of the American Catholic Church, shortly before the publication of a devastating report on the mbadive abuses in Pennsylvania.

In 2015, Pope Francis accepted the resignation of Bishop Keith O. Brien from all rights of Cardinal, after resigning two years ago as archbishop of Edinburgh after being accused of "inappropriate acts" with young priests. The prelate, however, retains the title of cardinal until his death in March 2018.

The only case of abandoning the supreme cardinal title goes back to 1927, when Pope Pius XI accepted the resignation. of French cardinal Lois Billot, who had resigned for political reasons.