Vatican expels US cardinal McCarrick accused of abuse

88-year-old American cardinal Theodore McCarrick was expelled from the Vatican by Pope Francis After being accused of badual abuse against at least one teenager almost half a century ago. The news has been confirmed by an official statement.

This is the first time in the history of the Catholic Church that a cardinal excludes himself for reasons of badual abuse. This measure was reached after the pontiff declared finalize the sentence of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a Vatican institution that ensures respect for Catholic dogma.

The punishment is final and arrives before the crucial meeting, from 21 to 24 February, with the presidents of episcopal conferences around the world at the Vatican, where they will address the responsibility of the prelates who have remained silent about badual badault. minors perpetrated by the clergy.

After cases revealed in the United States, Chile, and Germany defeated trust in the Catholic Church, the Pope promised zero tolerance for abuse and badured that he was not guilty. he would be uncompromising with the high ecclesiastical hierarchy.

Keeping his word, the excardinal emperor of Washington had already been banned in July from exercising his ministry and then resigned from his honorary 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 case began in 2017, when the Holy See asked the Archdiocese of New York to pursue an investigation, after the testimony of a man who accused the prelate of having badually badaulted him in the 1970s.

Moreover, in 2015, the Vatican has accepted the resignation of Monseor Keith O. Brien of all the rights of the cardinalate, after resigning two years ago as archbishop of Edinburgh after being accused of "inappropriate acts" with young priests. The prelate nevertheless retains the title of cardinal until his death in March 2018.